Toy talk

From The New York Times :

Baby laptops, baby cellphones, talking farms — these are the whirring, whiz-bang toys of the moment, many of them marketed as tools to encourage babies’ language skills.

But in the midst of the holiday season, a new study raises questions about whether such electronic playthings make it less likely that babies will engage in the verbal give-and-take with their parents that is so crucial to cognitive development.

Years ago, when Elaine was on the radio and I did the weekly grocery shopping, a produce clerk complimented me for talking all the time with my children — pointing things out, asking them questions, answering their questions. The clerk explained that he had noticed us over many visits. No doubt he saw all kinds of parents in that store.

The educational future that some envision — every child communing with a device — is not one I favor. Nothing beats talking with people. (Though I am curious about that farm.)

Typewriter repairers

Sean noticed my use of repairmen in a post about typewriters and handwriting. I chose the word repairmen eyes open (that is, aware of -men ), since “the last typewriter repairman” is a recurring bit of journalism. (Try it.)

But I just discovered Nellie Myra Thatcher (d. 1958), who repaired typewriters in New York and was described in 1919 as “the first woman typewriter ‘repairman.’” And I also just discovered that in 2010, Mariana Keller of The Wall Street Journal made a short film about Donna Brady, whom Keller calls a typewriter repairwoman. The workspace we see in that film does not suggest a repair shop (with tools, spare parts, and machines dropped off for fixing): Brady’s business seems to have been a matter of cleaning up and reselling typewriters at flea markets. (I can imagine a courtroom battle over the meaning of repair : does applying machine oil to a moving part count?) At any rate, the business, Type B, now appears to be on hiatus or closed.

And at any rate, I’ve added repairers to repairmen in my post, acknowledging the journalists’ phrasing but acknowledging too that not all those who repair are men. Thanks, Sean, for getting me to rethink it.

Related reading
All OCA typewriter posts (Pinboard)

Recently updated

The Vinegar Flies Now with more flies.

Domestic comedy

[Elaine made a killer soup .]

“And you didn’t measure anything?”

“I measured two bunches of scallions and one onion.”

“That’s not measuring; that’s counting!”

Related reading
All OCA domestic comedy posts (Pinboard)

[No leeks at the supermarket. So instead: potatoes, scallions, an onion, chicken stock, butter, milk, salt. Elaine added more details in the comments.]

Typewriters and handwriting

A headline, seen by chance: “Could handwriting be going the way of typewriters?” The writer is wondering, of course, if handwriting is moving toward extinction. But it’s just as possible to hear the question as suggesting the rediscovery of a neglected (and perhaps beautiful) means of self-expression and communication.

It is unlikely, though, that there will be newspaper articles about the last handwriting repairmen, or repairers.

Related reading
All OCA handwriting and typewriter posts (Pinboard)

Proustian

Oscar’s Day today is Proustian.

Robert Walser: winter

Robert Walser, The Tanners , trans. Susan Bernofsky (New York: New Directions, 2009).

Related reading
All OCA Robert Walser posts (Pinboard)

[Easy to miss its arrival yesterday. High: 56 °F. Low: 42 °F.]

Bukowski, Gavitsky

[“Slouching Toward Gavitsky,” Zippy, December 21, 2015.]

Dingburg’s Slouch Gavitsky channels Charles Bukowski. The poem in play is “The Shoelace.”

Related reading
All OCA liverwurst posts (Pinboard)
All OCA Zippy posts (Pinboard)
Zippy and Bukowski

A 2016 calendar

[Nancy , December 10, 1955.]

There’s a new calendar from me, too, offered free of charge as a PDF (via Dropbox). It’s three months per page, in black and red Gill Sans Bold. I started making this kind of calendar in 2009, just to see if I could do it. (My inspiration was the Field Notes Calendar: I could not bring myself to spring for three or four of them.) Year by year, getting things right became easier. Now it’s a breeze.

The 2016 calendar contains the elusive “February 29.” Even with an extra day, the calendar comes in at only 34 KB. Stapler, hole punch, thumbtack, hammer, string, nail, wall not included.


[“End of the line, February! You’re through!”]

And while I’m thinking about the means by which I’m making this calendar available: if anyone can use a Dropbox referral code, this one’s mine. It brings extra free storage for any new user and for me.

Clutter, clutter, everywhere

From The New York Times, Paco Underhill on clutter, retail and domestic:

In supermarkets and big-box stores, the strategic placement of goods is essential in building incremental sales. The origins of the “stack it high and watch it fly” mentality come from the way goods were originally brought into big-box stores: via forklift. As a result, the aspirational spaces we all long for in our homes — clean, uncluttered, perhaps with a few white phalaenopsis orchids sprinkled around — are completely at odds with the stores we shop in.

He goes on to offer some good advice for “consumers” — which would be all of us.

[I have only a slight acquaintance with Underhill’s work. But I can recommend his 1999 book Why We Buy .]