Asking, not asking

From The Washington Post: “A single word sparks a crossfire between the Supreme Court, NPR and its star reporter Nina Totenberg.”

At issue: whether Chief Justice John Roberts, “in some form, asked the other justices to mask up” in the courtroom, as Nina Totenberg had reported for NPR. Roberts denied making that request, and NPR’s public editor, Kelly McBride, deemed the word asked “inaccurate” and “misleading,” and called for a clarification, which has yet to appear.

The part of the Post report that interests me:

On Friday, NPR spokesperson Isabel Lara reiterated the organization’s support for Totenberg. She said McBride “is independent and doesn’t speak on behalf of NPR.”

Lara added, “Someone can ask without explicitly asking. Someone can say, ‘This person doesn’t feel comfortable being around people who aren’t masked’ or some other permutation of that and the listeners get the message.”

Exactly. That’s basic pragmatics.

In the polite, restrained setting of the Supreme Court, the indirect approach — “I think it better that we all wear masks in court,” or words along those lines — seems apt. To say such words is still to make a request. In claiming not to have made a request, Roberts might be parsing his words a bit too literally, without regard for pragmatics.

All this parsing might have been avoided if Justice Gorsuch had just worn a damn mask.

Today’s Saturday Stumper

Today’s Newsday  Saturday Stumper is by Stella Zawistowksi, whose last Stumper appeared in December 2020. I’m happy to see her back. The name of her crosswords-and-trivia website explains why: Tough As Nails. This puzzle was challenging (but doable) and filled with reasons for delight.

Some of them:

2-D, ten letters, “Highly selective.” PERSNICK — no, won’t fit.

16-A, ten letters, “Question at a Q&A.” Heh.

20-A, five letters, “L.A. museum benefactor.” Whatever one might think of the benefactor, it’s a great museum.

21-A, five letters, “Protection from winding.” I first thought of my horribly coiled headphone cord.

36-A, fifteen letters, “Still very much with us.” Just a fun phrase.

43-D, six letters, “Puts together, as pattern pieces.” I have to look into this word, which has an unusual array of meanings.

48-D, five letters, “What many gloves are made of.” The first letter might lead you in the wrong direction.

58-D, three letters, “Only 50-state TV network.” Really? Huh.

61-A, ten letters, “Refuses to stand for it.” Literalizing.

My favorite clues in this puzzle:

23-D, five letters, “Ignore a Simpsons suggestion.” D’oh!

58-A, four letters, “Designations requiring defenses.” I thought “Football positions?”

No spoilers; the answers are in the comments.

Thích Nhất Hạnh (1926–2022)

The New York Times has an obituary.

I like this passage from The Miracle of Mindfulness (1999):

I like to walk alone on country paths, rice plants and wild grasses on both sides, putting each foot down on the earth in mindfulness, knowing that I walk on the wondrous earth. In such moments, existence is a miraculous and mysterious reality. People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don't even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.

“Even before Amy came in”

Henry James, “The Third Person” (1900).

Elaine and I have been reading a volume of Henry James’s ghost stories with diminishing patience. The Turn of the Screw — great. But the other stories are a mixed bag, and Jamesian syntax doesn’t help. I lost my mind a little with the sentence above and made a motion, with two stories left, to move on. Elaine seconded. The motion carried. So even before Amy came in, we were out. And we turned this afternoon to Tempest-Tost, the first volume of Robertson Davies’s Salterton Trilogy.

[The volume in question: “The Turn of the Screw” and Other Ghost Stories, ed. Susie Boyt (New York: Penguin, 2017).]

Mary Miller again

For a third time, Representative Mary Miller (R, Illinois-15) appears in The New Yorker (January 31). She’s mentioned in Jane Mayer’s long, revealing article about Virginia Thomas, the hard-right activist married to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas:

Ginni Thomas has her own links to the January 6th insurrection. Her Web site, which touts her consulting acumen, features a glowing testimonial from Kimberly Fletcher, the president of a group called Moms for America: “Ginni’s ability to make connections and communicate with folks on the ground as well as on Capitol Hill is most impressive.” Fletcher spoke at two protests in Washington on January 5, 2021, promoting the falsehood that the 2020 election was fraudulent. At the first, which she planned, Fletcher praised the previous speaker, Representative Mary Miller, a freshman Republican from Illinois, saying, “Amen!” Other people who heard Miller’s speech called for her resignation: she’d declared, “Hitler was right on one thing — he said, ‘Whoever has the youth has the future.’”

Related reading
All OCA Mary Miller posts

A lost art

From Till the End of Time (dir. Edward Dmytryk, 1946). A cowboy, Bill Tabeshaw (Robert Mitchum), opines:

“I thought letter writing was a lost art, like steer milking.”

Related reading
All OCA letter posts (Pinboard)

Pluto again

A New York Times interactive feature: “Is Pluto a Planet?”

Orange Crate Art has always been in Pluto’s corner, small as that corner may be.

Related reading
All OCA Pluto posts (Pinboard)

Recently updated

Professor gone wild The professor who called his students “vectors of disease” is threatening to sue his school.

EXchange names on screen

Cliff Harper (Guy Madison) is home, courtesy of MAdison 1234. And he will soon see more exchange names in his family’s telephone directory.

[From Till the End of Time (dir. Edward Dmytryk, 1946). Click either image for a larger view.]

More EXchange names on screen
Act of Violence : The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse : Armored Car Robbery : Baby Face : Black Widow : Blast of Silence : The Blue Dahlia : Blue Gardenia : Boardwalk Empire : Born Yesterday : The Brasher Doubloon : The Brothers Rico : The Case Against Brooklyn : Chinatown : Craig’s Wife : Danger Zone : The Dark Corner : Dark Passage : Deception : Deux hommes dans Manhattan : Dick Tracy’s Deception : Down Three Dark Streets : Dream House : East Side, West Side : Escape in the Fog : Fallen Angel : Framed : Hollywood Story: The Little Giant : Loophole : The Man Who Cheated Himself : Modern Marvels : Murder by Contract : Murder, My Sweet : My Week with Marilyn : Naked City (1) : Naked City (2) : Naked City (3) : Naked City (4) : Naked City (5) : Naked City (6) : Naked City (7) : Naked City (8) : Naked City (9) : Nightfall : Nightmare Alley : Nocturne : Old Acquaintance : Out of the Past : Perry Mason : Pitfall : The Public Enemy : Railroaded! : Red Light : Side Street : The Slender Thread : Stage Fright : Sweet Smell of Success (1) : Sweet Smell of Success (2) : Tension : This Gun for Hire : The Unfaithful : Vice Squad : Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?

Getting free COVID tests via USPS

WNYC reports that people who live at an address not registered with the USPS as a multi-unit dwelling have been unable to order free COVID tests if someone from the same address has already ordered them. What to do: fill out this form, or call 1-800-ASK-USPS.

And if you havent yet requested free COVID tests: here’s the sign-up page.