Watch Your Language

Catherine Seipp makes some good observations about what is and is not acceptable language in public or on TV these days. It's really hard to argue that political correctness has not made a hash of what were once pretty straight-forward rules.

She cites many examples of TV show producers trying to steer a safe course through this maze. One such:

"I can't get away with it," responded Angel's Tim Minear, whose new show The Inside is a Silence of the Lambs-style gorefest that will premiere on Fox later this year. "Children are gutted on my show from stem to stern, but I couldn't have a serial killer say the word 'retard' because that would have been insensitive."

But the take-away is the last paragraph:

Anyway, last week I noticed a great anecdote about all this over at Reason's Hit & Run blog. A commenter wrote about a friend of his in Montana called Ray, who was pulled over by a policeman one day for having an insensitive vanity plate that read RAYTARD: "Ray offered to replace it with one that said DISRAYBLED. The officer was not amused. True story."

Shaken But Not Stirred

Teresa left a week ago, on the 21st, for a month of volunteer medical duty in Banda Aceh, Sumatra, one of the areas hardest hit by the tsunami 3 months ago. Lo and behold Sumatra is hit today with another large magnitude earthquake, this one off the west coast of Sumatra (Banda Aceh is at the northern tip of the large island).

I got a brief email from her sister indicating that Teresa and her team are okay, but indeed got a big shake. Here's more on the earthquake.

Permission to descend?

He's All Over The Lot

There's only one person who writes like this (on the difficulty of writing about dreams):

....at best you can communicate the impression left by a dream, the bizarre discordant fugue whose lurid logic you instinctively grasp at the time and lose as soon as you swing feet to the floor. But sometimes they stay with you all day, and you can feel the dream’s peculiar power for hours. Even so, who cares?

Yep, Lileks. Fun with Gnat today, too.

Okay. It’s Monday night; finished the Strib column and the Newhouse column. And it’s only eleven. Wonderful day, in an ordinary way. Gnat, I have learned with pleasure, has gotten bored with TV. She turns it off after one show in the morning, plays with her computer or gets out the Barbies and creates little stories. (The other day I caught her marrying two Care Bears: “Do you take this husband to be a wife?” ) She went downstairs to the keyboard, got out the sheet music and learned a tune we hadn’t yet attempted. As I may have noted, I gave up on strict lessons, and more or less ignore the week’s assignments if she balks. She’s just a kid. Better she learn the joy of music now than have it driven out with rote drudgery. As a result she wants to do more than the lessons require, and the look on her face when she masters a tune is indescribable – not just the pleasure of accomplishment, but the ventricle-piercing expression of joy for having made me proud. You want to tell the kid that everything makes you proud, but that’s something they’d best not know right now, or they hand you loose playing cards and you have to act like they’ve split the atom.

More on dreams, beer bottle labels, sci-fi, etc., here. Very Lileksian today, which is to say good.

Email Funnies

Someone emailed me these funnies. Normally I'm a black hole for these things, not one to keep passing them along. But these are too good.

Accounts of actual exchanges between airline pilots and control towers around the world. ============================================================
Tower: "Delta 351, you have traffic at 10 o'clock, 6 miles!"
Delta 351: "Give us another hint! We have digital watches!" ============================================================
"TWA 2341, for noise abatement turn right 45 Degrees."
"Centre, we are at 35,000 feet. How much noise can we make up here?"
"Sir, have you ever heard the noise a 747 makes when it hits a 727?"
============================================================
O'Hare Approach Control to a 747: "United 329 heavy, your traffic is a Fokker, one o'clock, three miles, Eastbound."
United 329: "Approach, I've always wanted to say this... I've got the little Fokker in sight." ============================================================
A DC-10 had come in a little hot and thus had an exceedingly long roll out after touching down. San JoseTower noted: "American 751, make a hard right turn at the end of the runway, if you are able. If you are not able, take the Guadeloupe exit off Highway 101, make a right at the lights and return to the airport." ============================================================
There's a story about the military pilot calling for a priority landing because his single-engine jet fighter was running "a bit peaked." Air Traffic Control told the fighter jock that he was number two, behind a B-52 that had one engine shut down. "Ah," the fighter pilot remarked, "The dreaded seven-engine approach."
============================================================
A Pan Am 727 flight waiting for start clearance in Munich overheard the following:
Lufthansa (in German): "Ground, what is our start clearance time?"
Ground (in English): "If you want an answer you must speak in English."
Lufthansa (in English): "I am a German, flying a German airplane, in Germany. Why must I speak English?"
Unknown voice from another plane (in a beautiful British accent): "Because you lost the bloody war."
============================================================
Tower: "Eastern 702, cleared for takeoff, contact Departure on frequency 124.7"
Eastern 702: "Tower, Eastern 702 switching to Departure. By the way, after we lifted off we saw some kind of dead animal on the far end of the runway."
Tower: "Continental 635, cleared for takeoff behind Eastern 702, contact Departure on frequency 124.7. Did you copy that report from Eastern 702?"
Continental 635: "Continental 635, cleared for takeoff, roger; and yes, we copied Eastern... we've already notified our caterers." ============================================================
The German air controllers at Frankfurt Airport are renowned as a short-tempered lot. They not only expect one to know one's gate parking location, but how to get there without any assistance from them. So it was with some amusement that we (a Pan Am 747) listened to the following exchange between Frankfurt ground control and a British Airways 747, call sign Speedbird 206.
Speedbird 206: "Frankfurt, Speedbird 206 clear of active runway."
Ground: "Speedbird 206 Taxi to gate Alpha One-Seven." The BA 747 pulled onto the main taxiway and slowed to a stop.
Ground: "Speedbird, do you not know where you are going?"
Speedbird 206: "Stand by, Ground, I'm looking up our gate location now."
Ground (with quite arrogant impatience): "Speedbird 206, have you not been to Frankfurt before?"
Speedbird 206 (coolly): "Yes, twice in 1944, but it was dark, -- And I didn't land."
===========================================================
While taxiing at London's Gatwick Airport, the crew of a US Air flight departing for Ft.Lauderdale made a wrong turn and came nose to nose with a United 727. An irate female ground controller lashed out at the US Air crew, screaming: "US Air 2771, where the hell are you going?! I told you to turn right onto Charlie taxiway! You turned right on Delta! Stop right there. I know it's difficult for you to tell the difference between C and D, but get it right!" Continuing her rage to the embarrassed crew, she was now shouting hysterically: "God! Now you've screwed everything up! It'll take forever to sort this out! You stay right there and don't move till I tell you to! You can expect progressive taxi instructions in about half an hour, and I want you to go exactly where I tell you, when I tell you, and how I tell you! You got that, US Air 2771?" Yes, ma'am," the humbled crew responded. Naturally, the ground control communications frequency fell terribly silent after the verbal bashing of US Air 2771. Nobody wanted to chance engaging the irate ground controller in her current state of mind. Tension in every cockpit out around Gatwick was definitely running high. Just then an unknown pilot broke the silence and keyed his microphone, asking: "Wasn't I married to you once?"

I think the Lebanese pro-Democracy rallies deserve our fullest support!

What's the Deal with the Cedar Flag?

Does it seem like there are some


very nice looking young women


waving the Lebanese cedar flag?

A March Day

They don't make tunnels like they used to

It might be warm enough for a dip

That'll do just fine.

The Newmanium

From Seinfeld Scripts #154:

Jerry and George are in the back of a cab. George has been trying to get fired by the Yankees; he's lamenting to Jerry:

JERRY: How could they not fire you?
GEORGE: Never thought I'd fail at failing.
JERRY: Aw, come on there now.
GEORGE: (depressed) Feel like I can't do anything wrong.
JERRY: Nonsense. You do everything wrong.
GEORGE: (hopeful) Everything?
JERRY: Everything.
GEORGE: You really think so?
JERRY: Absolutely. I have no confidence in you.
GEORGE: Alright. I guess I just have to pick myself up, dust myself off, andthrow myself right back down again!
JERRY: That's the spirit. You suck!
GEORGE: (pleased) I know.