New England Mobile Book Fair

A belated goodbye: I learned by chance yesterday that the New England Mobile Book Fair closed last August. The closing is likely permanent.

Here’s an article that explains what happened. And here’s a post from a 2010 visit.

Pedro Almodóvar in my local paper

I wonder what algorithm chose this headline as one of the three top stories in the online edition of my local paper: “Pedro Almodóvar warns against algorithms in Instagram row.”

Whatever. I will now be on the lookout for the forthcoming Almodóvar movie, Madres paralelas [Parallel mothers].

Here, from ABC News, is the story of Almodóvar’s battle against an algorithm. To read the story in my local paper would require a battle with a paywall.

Our household is an Almodóvar-friendly zone: Elaine and I have seen sixteen of his movies. But we gave up on the local paper in 2008. We had our reasons, good ones.

Today’s Saturday Stumper

I set up my iPad at the kitchen table to do the crossword. The 11th Hour ran at the far end of our mid-century all-in-one room. The minutes went by.

“Are you done yet?” Elaine asked. It was getting late. “Only halfway,” I answered. And at some point I realized that today’s Newsday  crossword, by Greg Johnson, was another Saturday Stumper. No wonder it took so long (twenty-three minutes).

That makes two consecutive Stumpers. And much greater difficulty with this week’s puzzle — that’s good.

Some clue-and-answer pairs I especially liked:

6-D, six letters, “What some projections and pitchers provide.” Very clever.

11-D, ten letters, “Common grade-school homework.” Yes indeed. And now I’m wondering when they became a thing.

16-A, three letters, “‘Sharp’ starter.” I learned something.

17-A, fifteen letters, “’70s kids’ educational animated-short series.” I know it only from later parodies and repurposings.

19-D, thirteen letters, “Taunt for a hand.” My first thought was of an insult comedian.

28-D, ten letters, “Uranium ore, from the Latin for ‘violet.’” From the west-central region, the toughest part of the puzzle. Just try to figure out what the first letter might be.

45-D, six letters, “Drop-box legend.” Oh, now I get it. Fun to see this answer below 9-D, three letters, “Makes greater.”

50-A, five letters, “About 591 drops.” I’d like to say I learned something, but I will forget this factoid posthaste.

56-A, fifteen letters, “App you can’t download.” I am 48-A, six letters, “Finding something funny.”

One clue whose answer I don’t understand: 44-A, seven letters, “Score fourth.” Fourth? Huh?

No spoilers; the answers are in the comments.

Snopes and plagiarism

David Mikkelson, co-founder of Snopes, turns out to be a serial plagiarist.

Mikkelson’s acknowledgement of “multiple serious copyright violations of content that Snopes didn’t have rights to use” is a tad disingenuous. Using text without permission might be a copyright violation. Putting your own name on that text is plagiarism. Putting your name on a slightly altered version of that text: that, too, is plagiarism.

If you’re “rewording,” as students say, you’re plagiarizing.

Related posts
“Rewording” : Rogeting

[I always mistype plagiarism as plagiairism. I am nothing if not consistent.]

Poverty and dignity

“I think if there’s one thing I’ve learned in thirty-five years, it’s the opposite of poverty isn’t wealth. The opposite of poverty is dignity”: Jacqueline Novogratz, from Alan Alda’s podcast Clear + Vivid.

Alda and Perlman

Alan Alda talking with his friend Itzhak Perlman, at the 92nd Street Y and in Perlman’s kitchen.

Thanks, Kevin.

[The post title first had “Alan.” I mix up his first and last names often when trying to solve crosswords fast.]

Alan Alda as Young Poet

While I think of it: if you’ve never seen the Naked City episode “Hold for Gloria Christmas,” it’s at YouTube. Alan Alda appears as Young Poet, no name, in an episode devoted to Beat culture and Greenwich Village. His appearance begins at the 27:55 mark.

Two related posts
Positively Naked City (West 4th Street locations in the episode) : Of Harrises and Kings (Real-life models for two characters in the episode)

Alan Alda now and then

Alan Alda made an appearance on The Late Show last night. He was a delightful guest, talking about acting and his podcast series, Clear + Vivid.

Alan Alda is now eighty-five. How did that happen? He was the speaker at my college commencement, Fordham College, 1978, forty-three years ago. Forty-three years ago: how did that happen? I remember just one point Alda (FC ’56) made, which I think was the point of his address. He tasked graduates with asking themselves, every now and then, this question: “What are my values?” I remember it as a suggestion to check in with yourself, a way of asking “Is this who I am, who I want to be?”

I can find no account of the commencement to let me know if my memory is accurate. But here’s an Alda commencement address from 2015 that touches on a similar theme.

My dad once did tile work in the house of Alda’s next-door neighbor in Leonia, New Jersey. So being the kind of dad he was, he took a copy of the commencement program with him and knocked, hoping to get an autograph for me. I think he said a maid answered the door. Alan Alda wasn’t home. I think that if he had been home, he would have signed.

[In 1978 the fake Vonnegut commencement address Alda read in 2015 hadn’t yet been written. A 2017 article notes that Alda flew back to Leonia from Los Angeles every weekend while working on M*A*S*H. Perhaps he was out west when my dad knocked. Important: I had no idea what my dad was up to.]

Block that chyron

A CNN chyron just now: “respitory therapist.”

Related reading
All OCA misspelling posts (Pinboard)

Jeopardy and Neuriva

It’s dispiriting to see a spokesperson for a dubious brain supplement chosen as one of the new hosts of Jeopardy. I speak of Mayim Bialik, actor, “actual neuroscientist,” and television spokesperson for the supplement Neuriva Plus. You can read about Neuriva and Neuriva Plus here, here, and here.

I think of Neuriva as the new Prevagen. But it’s difficult to think of Mayim Bialik as the new Alex Trebek.

[The other new host: Mike Richards, executive producer of Jeopardy. The identifying phrase “actual neuroscientist” comes from the Neuriva commercial. It’s not clear that Bialik has ever worked as a neuroscientist.]