The World

Monica vs. The Scrubs

From the voice of “Hey!  Girl’s name!” comes:

JD: So this intern that you mentioned earlier; I’m sure eventually he turned into a pretty amazing doctor, didn’t he?

Dr. Cox: Actually it was a she.

JD: It wasn’t me?

Dr. Cox: No, no.  It was you.  It was you.

Scrubs is back!  (And I’m only three episodes behind, thanks to ABC’s unfortunate policy of making people download completely pointless software to watch videos on their website — a policy that makes us hate them with the white hot intensity of a thousand suns.  That’s right ABC.  Flash is your friend.)

Radiological Janitors?

Bryan Bender reports in this morning’s Boston Globe about security arrangements for Barack Obama’s upcoming inauguration:

Because the biggest fear is a large-scale terrorist attack, the Pentagon will have on hand specially trained troops to deal with the aftermath of a chemical or biological attack, or radioactive fallout from a “dirty bomb.”

I’m glad we have people trained in handling the aftermath, but please somebody tell me we have other people trained in keeping there from ever being an aftermath!

OMG, Like, LOL!

YouTube comments are infamously the most inane drivel found anywhere in the entire history of humanity’s written communication. In particular, I’ve always been bothered (to the extent I ever read YouTube comments) by the egotism implicit in the “discussion.”  Commenters make their primary purpose communicating to others their unique expertise in any subject, and hence their unique qualification to judge it.  With nobody caring what anyone else has written, and instead focusing only on showcasing their own knowledge, showmanship wholly replaces any semblance of commentary.

Hence, when I read about artist Steve Lambert’s project reading aloud YouTube comments, I did not expect to be impressed.

I was impressed.

While playing a video of Leonard Bernstein conducting the New York Philharmonic Orchestra in Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 5, performers read aloud comments that were earlier posted in response to the same video.

The juxtaposition of this beautiful piece of music in a classic performance with the jarring inhumanity of the modern responses makes the result inexplicably enthralling.

(via Kottke)

Apple IS the Future

In the Doctor Who episode Silence in the Library, The Doctor takes Donna to the 51st century where humans have built a library “so big it doesn’t need a name” — an entire planet filled with books.   Throughout the episode, he finds himself checking The Library’s computer system via a terminal that looks suspiciously familiar:

A 51st Century Keyboard

A 51st Century Keyboard

That’s right, it’s Apple’s current model of wireless keyboard, which I was touching with my own hand at the very moment the image came on the screen.  Apple’s design is so flawless that it will last fully 3,000 years.

Why I Have No Self-Control

Jonah Lehrer writes in the Ideas section of this morning’s Boston Globe:

Now scientists have begun to examine how the city affects the brain, and the results are chastening.  Just being in an urban environment, they have found, impairs our basic mental processes.  After spending a few minutes on a crowded city street, the brain is less able to hold things in memory, and suffers from reduced self-control.

This is particularly relvant to me because… wait… hang on, there was a reason… I just can’t remember it right now.

(Actually, the remedy Mr. Lehrer describes is to have more access to nature, even if it’s a view of trees from your window. So I’ll be needing a different excuse for poor memory and self-control.)

No Comment

In the past couple years I’ve sensed a trend toward news reports telling us that some party in the story could not be reached for comment.  We’ve always heard the phrase “no comment” in the news, but lately I’ve seen more phrases like “did not return calls seeking comment” and “could not be reached.”

I may just be noticing this for the first time, or it may really be a trend in this direction.  (Reporters being more specific?  Trying not to bother people more than necessary to print the story?  Perhaps people just have an easier time avoiding the press in an era of cell phones and caller ID.)

Either way, this seems to be the pinnacle (for now) of this type of remark, from the Daily Briefing section of this morning’s Boston Globe:

A 22-year-old man with cerebral palsy was left on a school bus by a driver on New Year’s Eve and spent the entire frigid night alone.

…

Calls to a possible number for the bus company were picked up by an answering machine that would not accept messages.

Wow.  Calls to a possible number were picked up by an answering machine that wouldn’t accept messages.

She Came From the North

The first news of 2009: a baby girl named Sasha was born on Northwest Airlines Flight 59 from Amsterdam to Boston.  The story starts out very pleasant:

“Everybody was there to help,” said [Dr. Natarajan] Raman, who helped deliver the child.  “People offered baby food, people brought things, people vacated their seats.”

Then it throws out this whopper:

Customs officials deemed [baby] Sasha a Canadian citizen, because she was born over Canadian airspace.  The flight landed about 45 minutes after the birth.

Well that’s a doozy.  If she’d waited another 10 or 15 minutes the kid would probably have been born in the United States.  Now she’ll be the only girl in her class whose nationality depended on the Global Positioning System, a radio, and a stopwatch.  You know she’ll never live that down.

Anybody else remember the West Wing episode where Donna finds herself suddenly Canadian?

Donna:  I’m very upset. I don’t know the words to my national anthem. I’ve been throwing out Canadian pennies my whole life. I’ve been making fun of the Queen. We don’t do that.

Cash Cab

I switched on the television briefly this morning and discovered a game show called Cash Cab on the Discovery Channel.

Someone hails an ordinary-looking cab in Manhattan (branded with the Taxi and Limousine Commission markings), announces their destination, and then unexpectedly becomes a contestant.  They win money (starting at $50) for each correct answer to a trivia question.  After three wrong answers, they’re kicked out of the cab wherever they happen to be.

Although I groaned upon seeing the name, the premise is surprisingly appealing upon further consideration, if for no reason other than that cab rides are not otherwise particularly exciting.  It also adds some interesting arbitrary influences into the game that traditional game shows don’t have.

For example, the length of a round depends mostly on where the passengers asked to go — which they did before they knew they were on a game show.  It’s then influenced by traffic density, traffic control, and other road conditions.  For example, when stuck at a red light, contestants might be given a “red light challenge.”

The screening process to find “worthy” contestants (done on most shows) is also eliminated.  Whoever happens to hail the cab is a candidate.  Certainly the producers only pick interesting rounds to air on the show, but that means a lot of people are playing (and even, perhaps, winning) whom we do not see.

On the other hand, having now watched one episode of the show I have no intention of trying to watch any more.  This sounds like an interesting game to play in a taxi, but not a particularly interesting show to watch on television.

On Germs and Kleenex

Last Monday on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Scarlett Johansson appeared with a cold she got from Samuel Jackson (who was in Star Wars with Natalie Portman, who will be in New York, I Love You with Kevin Bacon).

Jay Leno suggested she supply some of the valuable germs to a Kleenex in the usual manner and auction it on eBay.  She agreed, offering the proceeds to USA Harvest (“moving food from people who have too much, to those who have much too little”).

Ms. Johansson: How much do you think I’m gonna get for this?

Mr. Leno: More than ten dollars.

The auction closed last late last night, earning $5,300.

Scarlett Johansson's eBay Kleenex

Scarlett Johansson's eBay Kleenex

I’m somewhat discouraged to see that Charity Navigator doesn’t even list USA Harvest, but if we as a people will only be motivated to feed the hungry when a celebrity auctions a Kleenex for a charity with no rating, then we should stil give all we can.

Don’t Think About a White Bear

You might remember Dan Gilbert as the author of Stumbling on Happiness or as the presenter of one of the best-ever TED Talks back in 2004 (posted online in 2006).

I’ve just found a 15 minute talk he gave at Pop!Tech in 2007 on global climate change and why our brains don’t seem to care much about it.

It takes you just milliseconds to duck when somebody throws a baseball at your head because your brain is an exquisitely engineered “get out of the way” machine, and it’s constantly scanning the environment for things out of whose way it should right now get.

Quite apart from the interesting content, that particular sentence was wonderfully phrased.