June 6, 1944

[“Somewhere in England, American soldiers of the 9th Army Air Corps advance HQ board an LCT (tank transport) landing craft for the trip to the beaches of Normandy & the Allied invasion of France, aka D-Day.” Photograph by Frank Scherschel. June 6, 1944. From the Life Photo Archive. Click for a larger view.]

VDP on songwriting in these times

Van Dyke Parks on songwriting in these times:

Forty years ago, co-writing a song with Ringo Starr would have provided me a house and a pool. Now, estimating 100,000 plays on Spotify, we guessed we’d split about $80. When I got home, on closer study, I found out we were way too optimistic.

Read it all: Van Dyke Parks on How Songwriters Are Getting Screwed in the Digital Age (The Daily Beast).

Related reading
All OCA Van Dyke Parks posts (Pinboard)

Mark Trail revised

[Bear and friends, May 23, 2014. Mark Trail panel, May 15, 2014. Click for a larger view.]

Related reading
All OCA Mark Trail posts (Pinboard)

Recently updated

ASCAP, all caps Why The New York Times spells it Ascap.

A Bryan Garner story

Bryan Garner says that this piece is based on a true story: How polish and attention to detail can win the motion (ABA Journal). Good advice for addressing any audience in writing. I like the dowdy dialogue:

“Jim, good usage isn’t nearly as fluid as you’re suggesting. Besides, I’m talking about current editorial standards. Have you ever heard of Theodore Bernstein or H.W. Fowler?”

Related reading
All OCA Bryan Garner posts (Pinboard)

[Orange Crate Art is a Garner-friendly zone.]

ASCAP, all caps

Odd to see The New York Times rendering the acronym for the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers as Ascap, especially when the article also mentions — with caps — BMI. But Ascap is Times style, as given in the paper’s Manual of Style and Usage. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate has the acronym in caps, as does ASCAP’s website. Why Ascap, Times?

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June 5: Why Ascap? The Manual of Style and Usage entry for acronym explains: “When an acronym serves as a proper name and exceeds four letters, capitalize only the first letter: Unesco, Unicef.” But then there’s FERPA. Or is it Ferpa?

Also from Robert Walser

Reading is as productive as it is enjoyable. When I read, I am a harmless, nice and quiet person and I don’t do anything stupid. Ardent readers are a breed of people with great inner peace as it were. The reader has his noble, deep, and long-lasting pleasure without being in anyone else’s way or bothering anyone. Is that not glorious? I should think so!

Robert Walser, “Reading,” in A Schoolboy’s Diary, trans. Damion Searls (New York: New York Review Books, 2013).

Other Walser posts
From “The Essay”
Robert Walser, Microscripts
Staying small

[I type Wasler for Walser, again and again. Is that not dumb? I should think so! Thanks, Chris.]

From Robert Walser

It’s much prettier, and thus much quicker, and thus much more sensitive and pleasing to write on clean, smooth paper, so always make sure you have good writing paper ready. Why else are there so many stationery stores?

Robert Walser, “The Essay,” in A Schoolboy’s Diary, trans. Damion Searls (New York: New York Review Books, 2013).

“The Essay” appears in Walser’s first book, Fritz Kocher’s Essays (1904), the collected schoolroom compositions of an imaginary boy.

The more I read of Robert Walser, the more I want to read. His work is uncompromised by any accommodation to reality.

Other Walser posts
Robert Walser, Microscripts
Staying small

Handwriting, again

“Children not only learn to read more quickly when they first learn to write by hand, but they also remain better able to generate ideas and retain information. In other words, it’s not just what we write that matters — but how”: What’s Lost as Handwriting Fades (The New York Times).

Related reading
All OCA handwriting posts (Pinboard)

Tovolo Perfect Cube, uncool tool

Last December I somehow found my way to a Cool Tools post about Tovolo ice-cube trays. I bought a set of Perfect Cube trays and soon began to wonder why ice water was tasting awful. How awful? Like a cross between freezer and rubber. Was our water really that bad? No. These trays stink, and they impart a stink to the ice cubes they hold. It’s most noticeable if I’m drinking ice water, less noticeable with bourbon or iced tea.

I called Tovolo this morning and was told what a Cool Tools commenter was told two years ago — that silicone absorbs odors at low temperatures. Which would seem to make it a poor choice for ice-cube trays, right? Not according to Tovolo. In the event of stink (my word not theirs), the company recommends washing the trays with two parts vinegar and one part water, every two months or so. Another suggestion: don’t store ice cubes in the trays themselves. I couldn’t help laughing about that one. You can see where this is going: the Tovolo tray becomes a complication, an object in need of maintenance. Not a cool tool at all. Very uncool, if you ask me. I would never have purchased these trays had I known that they would require scheduled maintenance and off-site storage.

The person I spoke with said that the company sells thousands of trays and that very few have these problems. Yet a prominent eBay seller who sells Tovolo has a page of directions for getting rid of the stink. In other words, it’s a Known Issue. And one- and two-star reviews on Amazon suggest that the stink is there to stay. To his credit, the person I spoke with said that Tovolo will replace trays when necessary. But I’m saving my vinegar and time and replacing the Tovolos with Rubbermaid trays. Elaine is using our Tovolos to store spools of thread. (Can thread stink?)

Had I read the comments at Cool Tools or even a smattering of Amazon reviews, I’d have balked at buying Tovolo trays. Note to self: read the comments next time, self. Don’t fall for shiny red objects before doing more reading.

[Yes, everything is less noticeable with bourbon.]