[“Four Panels in Search of an Algorithm.” Zippy , September 28, 2026. Click for a larger view.]
Today’s strip insists on the analog life.
Venn reading
All OCA analog posts : analog and Zippy posts : Zippy posts (Pinboard)
[As a youth, my dad set pins in a bowling alley. You can see how the work went, or still goes, at YouTube.]
Monday, September 28, 2026
“Hopelessly analog”
Western Electric 500
From the 99% Invisible podcast series A History of the United States in 100 Objects, an episode about the Western Electric 500, the telephone that was once ubiquitous in United States households.
I still have a thrift-store 500, a gift from my kids, which I used in my office, where its loud ring would sometimes startle students. I sometimes invited curious students to call when they came in to talk, just so they could hear the ring if they’d never heard it. I had it turned up to eleven. Several years before I retired, we lost our office phones — a cost-cutting measure. Now the 500 sits in a closet, sometimes taken out to entertain grandkids.
Given the discussion in this episode of telephony past, with room-length extension cords and young people talking away for hours at a time, I would have liked to have heard something about Tin Can, the faux-landline telephone for kids that helps foster the skills of person-to-person communication across a distance. It’s a nifty device. As durable as the Western Electric 500? We’ll have to wait and see.
Related reading
All OCA telephone posts (Pinboard)
Sunday, September 27, 2026
Elaine Dress Shop
[40 John Street, Financial District, Manhattan, c. 1939–1941. From the NYC Municipal Archives Collections. Click for a much larger view.]
There are a number of Elaine enterprises in the 1940 Manhattan directory:
[As seen via stevemorse.org.]
But only one has a tax photograph with a legible sign: Elaine Dress Shop.
Elaine Dress Shop appears to have been a fairly swank operation. Notice how few items of apparel appear in its windows. The New York Times shows a shop with the same name — the same shop? — taking a lease at 3½ Church Street in 1931. New York Times classified ads show the John Street shop looking for a slswoman [sic ] and an alteration hand in 1946. The shop later appears in a frankly insane advertising spread encouraging charge-account use.
[The New York Times, November 7, 1962. The listings for Lower Manhattan take up roughly half a column of a two-page six-column spread. Click for a larger view if you dare — the shop is in there, honest.]
At no. 42, Farrish’s Chop House. A short New Yorker item tells something of its history. At no. 44, not seen in this photograph, John Street United Methodist Church, the oldest United Methodist church in the United States.
And that’s all I’ve got.
This post is a slightly early anniversary present for my Elaine, though I think she’d rather have gotten the frock company.
*
September 28: I just realized that I posted a John Street tax photograph with a Chock full o’Nuts last year: Chock full o’Signs.
Related posts
More photographs from the NYC Municipal Archives (Pinboard)
Saturday, September 26, 2026
Today’s Saturday Stumper
Today’s Newsday Saturday Stumper is by Stan Newman, the puzzle’s editor, constructing as Lester Ruff. Sometimes I find Lester Ruff puzzles less rough; sometimes I find them as difficult as the average Stumper, as I did today. I sometimes have issues with what Stan calls “tough factual clues,” or what I would call arcane trivia. I started with 35-D, eight letters, “Bard’s ‘I love your Majesty’ speaker,” not arcane, and most helpful.
Some clue-and-answer pairs of note:
3-D, six letters, “King, birthwise.” Which one?
5-D, three letters, “Dieter’s complaint.” I was not fooled.
7-D, letters, “Hunt’s dad on Mad About You.” Here’s what I mean by arcane trivia. He appeared in this role in four of the original show’s 164 episodes, in 1996, 1997, and 1999. The name can be had by way of crosses, but still. There must be a better way to clue this name. I’ll suggest one in the comments.
9-D, three letters, “Senate salutation.” See 5-D.
14-A, five letters, “One-author first name on books in nine Dewey Decimal categories (1950-1992).” Less arcane than 7-D, if you think of someone known for cranking out books.
27-A, ten letters, “Cellphone part.” How about “one-time cellphone part”?
37-A, three letters, “Short-notice flight.”
42-A, four letters, “I think, therefore ” (’90s hardware slogan).” Predates my awareness of such hardware.
43-A, ten letters, “Daily's text + images + graphics.” Ugly word.
44-D, six letters, “‘The supreme master,’ per Christie.” If you say so.
55-A, five letters, “Canaries’ keeper.” I wondered if AVIAN is a word for a birdlover.
My favorite in this puzzle: 11-D, eight letters, “Toon with a niece Deezil.” Another tough factual clue, but it’s about a cartoon, and I learned something that I liked learning.
No spoilers; the answers are in the comments.
Zippy in the sun
[“Rabbit Hole.” Zippy, September 26, 2026. Click for a larger view.]
Today’s strip channels Edward Hopper — Zippy and Bugs have found their way into Hopper’s painting People in the Sun . The strip’s first oanel also echoes this panting, and the middle panel has a strong Hopper vibe.
Hopper’s work appears a number of times in Zippy. You can do a strip search to see them all.
Related reading
All OCA Zippy posts (Pinboard)
Friday, September 25, 2026
Crossplay
Playing Crossplay (The New York Times ) with our son Ben has turned Elaine and me into hardened criminals of this Scrabble-like board.
The beauty (?) of Crossplay is that you can try improbable combinations of letters, and if they don’t spell a real word, the app lets you know, and you can try something else. So you might as well try.
We will not be STOPT. Even if Ben is TALAR than we are.
*
I realized after writing the sentences above that playing this game is like walking down a street testing car doors to find one that’s unlocked.
Word Matters is back
The Merriam-Webster podcast Word Matters disappeared in 2022 after 100 episodes. I just discovered that it’s back, or sort of back, with four episodes in 2025 and 2026. I’ve listened to just one, “The Making of Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary , Twelfth Edition.” Highly recommended. And, yes, I have the twelfth on a nearby shelf.
Related reading
Word Matters on Orwell’s “Politics and the English Language” (They’re wrong) : A handful of other OCA Word Matters posts
Owner’s manuals, free
A great website, though it makes no claim to be complete: Car Owner’s Manuals.
No surprise to see the 2026 Toyota RAV4 manual among the most popular — the vehicle is like an operating system with a car attached. And besides, the manual is missing from the Toyota website. Having a searchable PDF as an alternative to the poorly indexed print manual is hugely helpful.
See also ManualsLib.
[Should that be owners’ manuals ? You’re welcome to overthink it for me.]
Thursday, September 24, 2026
The Heidi Overton window
I’m losing a good ninety minutes this morning watching what I put on for a minute before reading: a Senate confirmation hearing on C-SPAN 3 for Dr. Heidi Overton, the nominee to head the Food and Drug administration. She dodges question after question: Was the current occupant wrong when he said that acetaminophen causes autism? Was he wrong when he said that the MMR vaccine is lethal? Can he ever be wrong about something? (All real questions.)
She dodges and dodges, and dodges some more, and follows up every dodge with a thin smile.
I vote no.
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