Alone Again, Naturally

The newsletter SUNY Watch solicited short articles, no more than 75 words, I think, about "What I Did on My Summer Vacation" or "My Favorite Hobby".

Dutifully, I wrote:

Three trips to hometown Binghamton in July. #1 took place right after the flooding in the area, yet a scheduled party near the convergence of two rivers took place, with one sister coming from San Diego, mom, another sister, her daughter niece from Charlotte, and cousins from NYC. #2 was an annual reunion of my wife’s family (http://olinfamilysociety.org/); my daughter is 11th generation from John Olin. #3 was my high school reunion, described here.

The editor wrote back last week and said: "Unfortunately, yours was the only summer vacation response we received so we ultimately decided against putting together the feature we had been planning. It does sound like you had a good summer, though!"

Yes, it was.

But she got a "good response" on the hobbies question. Which makes me wonder: is it that people are traumatized about writing those summer vacation essays, or am I an iconoclast?
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Carol & I went to friend Mary's wedding to Rick on Saturday morning. It was a lovely affair, even though we only knew the bride, her son, and one other person. My favorite moment during the service was during the lighting of the candles. The musical citation in the program was Hunter/Garcia. Indeed, the organist had suggested, and the couple agreed, to have a church organ version of the the Grateful Dead song "Ripple" playing at that moment.
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Alan David Doane wants you to know about:
*Comic Book Galaxy and Houghton Mifflin's giveaway of a copy of THE BEST AMERICAN COMICS 2006, "an excellent new collection edited by Harvey Pekar."
*Paperback swap. "Free books! Post books you don't want by their ISBN code...and get credit to order your own stuff. All is costs is media mail for shipping, usually less than two bucks for a single book."
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After two books about the GWB administration that Karl Rove probably has on his bookshelf, Bob Woodward has put out State of Denial, reportedly a scathing indictment of our Iraq War policy. I haven't gotten it yet, but it seems from the reviews that it's not that it's saying anything I hadn't read or, at least believed, before. Its importance is that it's from a writer with great access to the administration, and thus may have more credibility with the fence-sitters. I wonder if this book will sway the elections next month? Lefty has something to say about this here. In fact, he has a number of good pieces in his new Page 3 section, about George Allen of Virginia and global warming.
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SOMEBODY has to answer Greg's quiz, so it might as well be me.
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Just two degrees of separation between me and Ben Pershing, who commented on disgraced ex-Congressman Mark Foley for PBS's NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.
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Got this e-mail yesterday:
Have you heard anything about Social Security Numbers and African-Americans and the 5th digit in your SS#? Supposedly, if you are an African American or a Minority the 5th digit in your SS# is EVEN, and ODD if you are White???
It has been said if you take a poll most African Americans will have an EVEN 5th digit. Rumor has it some companies are looking at potential employee's SS#s to discriminate.
Why not send this email to every African American and Minority that you know!! Mine was even, what's yours?
TAVIS SMILEY
THIS RUMOR IS FALSE, and I doubt Tavis Smiley has anything to do with it. And yes, my middle SSN digit is even.
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Don't expect any TV reviews here. I'm constantly behind on my viewing. Last night didn't help; while we taped Gilmore Girls (for both of us) and Dancing with the Stars (for my wife), I actually WATCHED baseball. The DVR operates anywhere from 70% to 80% full. So, go read Tosy about Gilmore Girls, Jaquandor about Studio 60 (still seen one day early) and Tom the Dog about everything else.