December 7th, 2007, 8 Comments »
Yesterday, Julie accused me of never having seen The Sound of Music. I took immediate offense, and challenged her to a Sound of Music trivia throwdown. These were the questions we asked each other (entirely without the web, I might add):
- What was the name of the Captain’s new lover?
- What was the name of the eldest daughter’s beau?
- What’s the betraying beau’s job?
- What were the names of all the kids?
- Where did the family escape to at the end of the film?
- What were the children’s play clothes made out of?
- What animal was featured in the puppet show the children created?
We came out about even. How’d you do?
Incidentally, the title of this post comes from a line from the duet “Sixteen Going on Seventeen”. The whole line goes:
Oh crap. I just searched for the original line, and found my own post from four years ago. I was going to write about the very same thing–the interesting etymology of the term ‘roué’. Clearly I have been blogging too long.
8 Comments »
August 4th, 2007, 6 Comments »
For a couple of weeks, while doing the dinner dishes, I’d watch some of Inside the Actor’s Studio on YouTube. It’s pretty much the only celebrity interview I can watch, because it’s mostly a discussion of craft, instead traffic violations and adopted babies.
At the end of each interview, before the guest takes questions from the student audience, inscrutable host James Lipton asks them ten questions. The questions are apparently Proustian, and based on a similar practice by French TV host Bernard Pivot.
Becky answered those ten questions recently, and seeing as it’s Saturday and all, I figured I’d do the same:
- What is your favorite word? Serendipity
- What is your least favorite word? Tumour
- What turns you on? Originality
- What turns you off? Bureaucracy
- What sound or noise do you love? The jungle at night
- What sound or noise do you hate? A Harley Davidson engine
- What is your favorite curse word? Bollocks
- What profession other than your own would you like to attempt? Archaeologist
- What profession would you not like to do? Surgeon
- If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates?“Nice work”
The Q & A that Lipton does is quick and fairly spontaneous, so I tried not to dwell on the questions.
And here’s a Fowleresque request–if you like, answer these ten questions in the comments, or on your own blog.
6 Comments »
June 10th, 2007, 5 Comments »
Thanks to this site (and despite the cheeky disclaimer on the Contact page), I probably get three to five unsolicited email questions from strangers a week. A few years ago, I used to ignore 60% of these emails.
Over time, I’ve observed how people I admire like Tim Bray and Seth Godin work hard to answer each email they receive. And they probably get ten or fifty times the email I do, so now I endeavour (though I don’t always succeed) to do the same.
To take a slight diversion, Derek pointed to this article about professionals getting constantly solicited for free advice:
Las Vegas poker champion Scott Fischman, who writes about online poker, says that when he’s invited to social gatherings, he has to decide: “Do I want to spend four hours answering questions [about card-playing] or should I just stay home?” If he does venture out, he strives to remain helpful, briefly explaining how winning at poker comes from “learning how to learn” the game.
Most of the questions that I receive can be answered by some judicious Google searching, so I often send people links to Google results pages. You know, teach a man to fish and all that.
But here’s the thing: at least half the people to whom I reply never respond to say thank you. I hate to sound like some fuddy-duddy, but a little courtesy goes a long way, especially in the anonymous, nearly context-free world of the Web.
Some subset of questions probably thinks its more courteous to choose not to send an otherwise meaningless thank-you email, but I don’t. I’d rather hear whether I’d helped them, and tkae the extra seven seconds to read and delete that email.
Don’t believe me? Go ask Curtis E. Bear.
5 Comments »
