SCHAEFER

The clue for 18 Across in today’s New York Times crossword — “‘The one beer to have when you’re having more than one’ sloganeer” — brings back the past. The answer (in crossword caps): SCHAEFER.

When the world was young, Schaefer Beer was everywhere. The Schaefer slogan, which formed the opening and closing lines of a compelling jingle, played a part even in my life as a third-grader. Our teacher, Roslyn Vistreich, Mrs. Vistreich, had assigned us the task of bringing in and telling a joke for the class. Mine:

Why did the doctor tell the expecting mother to drink Schaefer?

Because she was having more than one.

That’s funny — in at least a couple of ways. But Mrs. Vistreich was not amused. I was already on her bad side, being a clock-watcher, staircase talker, and whistler. The joke didn’t help. No joke.

Related reading
Schaefer Beer (Wikipedia)

Mr. White’s neighborhoods

E.B. White on New York City neighborhoods, each a few blocks long, each with its own drugstore, grocery store, liquor store, newsstand, shoe-repair place, and so on:

So complete is each neighborhood, and so strong the sense of neighborhood, that many a New Yorker spends a lifetime within the confines of an area smaller than a country village. Let him walk two blocks from his corner and he is in a strange land and will feel uneasy till he gets back.

Shopkeepers are particularly conscious of neighborhood boundary lines. A woman friend of mine moved recently from one apartment to another, a distance of three blocks. When she turned up, the day after the move, at the same grocer’s that she had patronized for years, the proprietor was in ecstasy — almost in tears — at seeing her. “I was afraid,” he said, “now that you’ve moved away I wouldn’t be seeing you any more.” To him, away was three blocks, or about seven hundred and fifty feet.

From Here Is New York (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1949), 29–30.

This essay in book form would be a wonderful gift for anyone hailing from or headed to the city. Never mind that White was writing in 1948. As he says in a foreword, the New York that he has described had already become a matter of the past by the time his book was published. It’s the reader’s job, he says, “to bring New York down to date,” though in a final dark meditation on Manhattan’s vulnerability to attacking planes, White has done the job for us.

Here Is New York is available again in hardcover, from The Little Bookroom. It’s this book I had in mind when I wrote last month that I pass up books that I would’ve bought without hesitation in the past. Maybe I’ll still get a copy. (But for now: thanks, library.)

A tip to speed up Firefox

I thought that when I switched to a Mac, I was done with defragmenting. But not entirely: Firefox (on any platform) seems to show significant improvement in speed after one defragments the Places database, the home of Bookmarks and History, like so:

1. Click on Tools, then Error Console.

2. Type the following (without returns) into the Code box:

3. Click on Evaluate.

Or install the “experimental” extension Vacuum Places Improved, which does the work for you on a regular basis.

Further reading
Speed up Firefox with VACUUM (Oremj’s Blog)

Enric Jardí on type

With its right-side-up and upside-down dual front covers, Enric Jardí’s Twenty-Two Tips on Typography (That Some Designers Will Never Reveal) / Twenty-Two Things That You Should Never Do with Typefaces (That Some Designers Will Never Tell You) (Barcelona/New York: Actar, 2007) is a cleverly designed two-in-one presentation of common-sense do’s and don’t’s about document design. Alas, Jardí’s advice is often undercut by an awkward translation from the Spanish. For instance:

It is often useful that these kinds of formulas have a fixed scale of element sizes beforehand. . . . However, it does occur that sometimes it is hard to see things even if they are exactly the planned size and in the place marked by the guidelines.

Even worse is a level of carelessness that suggests the absence of editing and proofing — sentence fragments, missing punctuation, even this sentence:

Look for contrast: itit iss better to have two very different typefaces than typefaces that “match.”

It’s even better though to correct typos.

Jardí’s advice is worth reading, but this book in its present form isn’t worth $24.95. Better to borrow (as I did) from a library.

A Mad Men sort of man, sort of

This man has been around for a while. The “Common Sense” Traveler’s Expense Book in which he stars has a 1989 calendar on its back cover and a 1970 copyright. The hat and overcoat and the line per day for telephone and telegram expenses suggest perhaps a still earlier origin.

In 2009, this wayfaring stranger is still making his way, still working for Beach Publishing Co., still with an automobile growing from his arm. His grandfather worked for Beach too. Grandson is now hoping for a small role in Mad Men.

What? There are no small roles? Only small actors? Then he’s your man, less than 2.5 inches tall. It’d be easy to find a place for him.

I found this “Common Sense” Traveler’s Expense Book some years ago in a stationery store, long after the 1989 calendar on the back cover was past its expiration date.

[This post is the sixth in an occasional series, “From the Museum of Supplies.” The museum is imaginary. The supplies are real. Supplies is my word, and has become my family’s word, for all manner of stationery items.]

Also from the Museum of Supplies
Real Thin Leads
Rite-Rite Long Leads
Mongol No. 2 3/8
Dennison's Gummed Labels No. 27
Fineline erasers

For college students and their parents

Useful stuff from Lisa Belkin at the New York Times’ Motherlode Blog: Checklists for Parents of College Students.

I’m inordinately happy to see that in a comment on this Times piece, a fellow prof — Kara, no last name — has mentioned my post How to e-mail a professor. Kara also offers some good advice:

I would encourage all students to communicate with their professors in person as much as possible, and to ask for help when they need it. This sounds like it should be obvious, but I’m amazed that many students don’t realize that their professors are more than glad to meet with them. I think many of us turn to email to communicate because of the convenience, but I’ve found that even a short 5 minute conversation with a student can make an enormous difference in their experience in a class.

What Kara says — “This sounds like it should be obvious” — is true of so much of the advice that college students can benefit from hearing. It’s not obvious, that is, until someone says it.

A related post
How to talk to a professor

Reading Rainbow ends

After twenty-six years, Reading Rainbow is ending. NPR interviewed John Grant of Buffalo’s WNED, which produced the show:

The show’s run is ending, Grant explains, because no one — not the station, not PBS, not the Corporation for Public Broadcasting — will put up the several hundred thousand dollars needed to renew the show’s broadcast rights.

Grant says the funding crunch is partially to blame, but the decision to end Reading Rainbow can also be traced to a shift in the philosophy of educational television programming. The change started with the Department of Education under the Bush administration, he explains, which wanted to see a much heavier focus on the basic tools of reading — like phonics and spelling.

Grant says that PBS, CPB and the Department of Education put significant funding toward programming that would teach kids how to read — but that’s not what Reading Rainbow was trying to do.

“Reading Rainbow taught kids why to read,” Grant says. “You know, the love of reading — [the show] encouraged kids to pick up a book and to read.”

My most vivid Reading Rainbow memories: LeVar Burton working the grill at Rosie’s Diner (in Little Ferry, New Jersey) and learning the mambo with Jackie Rio. Our whole family thought that Jackie and LeVar liked each other. Really liked each other. Like-liked each other. Lighthearted reverie aside, I feel real sorrow at the loss of Reading Rainbow.

Here, from a happier day, is LeVar singing the show’s theme:

LeVar Burton sings “Reading Rainbow” at Diggnation LA (YouTube)

Marcia Lebow (1919–2009)

From a beautifully written obituary for an extraordinary person:

Marcia was a person of strong passions — for music, family and friends —and strong convictions. The English language was not only her great joy, but an armada to be deployed at will.

Years ago in Boston, I knew Marcia very slightly, by way of her friendship with Elaine. Marcia had twice the energy and enthusiasm of people half her age. And her stories — imagine someone telling you about the time she went to visit Ira Gershwin. Yes, that Ira Gershwin. That was Marcia Lebow.

Marcia Wilson Lebow (Los Angeles Times)

Search committee at work

An academic search committee at work:

At first the candidate’s own list of questions felt refreshing, but soon became counter-productive to the interview process. His spirit of inquiry masked an indifference to time constraints and a passive-aggressive need to dominate the conversation. As another candidate cooled his heels, the request for him to conclude his thoughts on the ideal society scarcely registered as we wondered if, then began to wish that, someone would spike his drink.

Read more from the evaluations of imaginary search committees:

Belagir M. Synkina, Unsuitable candidates (Times Higher Education)

A related post
Mozart and tenure

Going to the meeting

Elaine and I went tonight to a “town hall meeting” on health care given by Congressman Tim Johnson (R, Illinois-15). It was a disappointing experience. Of the allotted sixty minutes, ten were lost waiting for Rep. Johnson to arrive. Nine were given over to introductory remarks. Rep. Johnson’s talking points in those remarks and thereafter remained consistent: we have the best health care system in the world (whoops and cheers); a public option is “socialized medicine” (whoops and cheers); it is time for people to “reclaim,” “take back” the government (more whoops, more cheers).

A public option, one audience member pointed out, is a prelude to, yes, communism. And speaking of things Russian, Rep. Johnson confessed to being troubled by the presence of an energy czar in the Obama administration. Johnson evidently has forgotten that czars are what communism did away with. But he has also forgotten that an energy czar was in place as far back as Richard Nixon’s administration.

I heard no clear arguments as to how to make health care more affordable in the absence of a public option. And as Elaine discovered, searching for health care on Johnson’s web page brings up the following:


[Click for a larger view.]

What most bothered me in Rep. Johnson’s remarks: his sneering references to President Obama, whom he twice called “our esteemed leader,” to general laughter. If that’s how he talks about the president in public, I can only imagine what he says in private.

Related reading
Lorem ipsum (Wikipedia article)