It has been decided that tomorrow is Passive Voice Day. Great fun will no doubt be had by all.
Florence Colgate has a perfect face. (What? We’re simply reporting on the results of a rigorous scientific study.)
Good news: you won’t cause a devastating explosion if you drive off with the gas pump nozzle still in your car.
Finally, Simon Doonan has a theory that explains the prevalence of tattoos.
If nothing else, this book promises to be an interesting read. The scandalous Baroness Pannonica de Koenigswarter—”Nica”—was arguably as much a part of New York’s emerging bebop scene as the now-legendary musicians themselves.
Of the dozen or so songs written for her, Thelonious Monk’s somewhat surreal offering is by far my favorite:
[audio:https://helveticka.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/03-Pannonica.mp3|titles=03 Pannonica]“Pannonica,” from Brilliant Corners (1956). Thelonious Monk, piano; Ernie Henry, alto sax; Sonny Rollins, tenor sax; Oscar Pettiford, bass; Max Roach, drums.
Speaking as a parent, this is pretty much how it feels.
Three days, three figures from my childhood…gone. RIP Dick Clark, Levon Helm, and Jonathan Frid. Time’s wingèd chariot, indeed.
A fun article over at the Washington Post on the victory of “hopefully.” A small quibble, though: the AP Stylebook is venerated? Really? By whom, precisely? (No, journalists don’t count.)
Igor Vovkovinskiy would prefer that you not compare him to a sturgeon. You’ve been warned.
Finally, another notable birthday this week: Fenway Park turns 100 today.
The first World Palindrome Champion was crowned last month. (For those of you less inclined toward word geekery, a palindrome is a word or phrase that reads the same backward as it does forward.)
The winner? A standup comedian from Portland, Oregon, who came up with the nonsensical “Devil Kay fixes trapeze part; sex if yak lived.”
Full results from the competition can be found here.
For my money, the finest biographer alive is Robert Caro. Esquire‘s Chris Jones takes a look at the guy who’s spent nearly 40 years chronicling the life of one man.
As an aside to those of you who think my sentences are too long, check this out:
“Caro’s sentences are long, fluid, intricate. (A single sentence in The Passage of Power contains a parenthetical, an em dash, a colon, a comma, another two commas, a semicolon, two more commas, and a period.)”
My kind of writer.
Bet you still know exactly who this is.
Designer Daily has seven more examples of how well-known companies adapted when forced to use non-Latin characters in their logos. Turns out it’s a pretty good test of your brand’s strength.
http://vimeo.com/37796909
Can’t…stop…watching…
All 54 of William Safire’s “Fumblerules of Grammar”—humorous, self-contradictory rules for writing—are over at Lists of Note.
While you’re there, be sure click on “Johnny Cash’s To-Do List” on the right.
Here’s a little time-waster that’ll make you feel superior: the Bad Opinion Generator. My favorite so far comes from William Helton, who, back in 1970, told the world that “mankind also faces the ominous possibilities of armies of asexually produced identical soldiers….”
Tired of the rain last week, the missus and I took leave of our fair city to see what other locales might have to offer. Here’s what we found…
What’s left of Winona, scene of a devastating explosion in 1907 that pretty much leveled the entire town.
The area north of Palouse Falls, looking south toward the Blue Mountains.
And, of course, the falls themselves.
A Nuttall’s cottontail…
…and a pair of American white pelicans floating in the calmer waters of the Snake River.
I was saddened to learn over the weekend of the passing of Stanley Ross. Stan was at the helm of Ross Printing Company for many years after its founding by his father, George. Today, his son Alan and grandson Benjamin continue to lead the company.
Stan was one of the first printing salesman I met when my career began and the finest I’ve ever known. Always the consummate professional, he was sharply dressed and affable, and I admired his taste in cars (Mercedes). In a gentle way, he knew how to take care of his customers while at the same time being firmly in control of his printing operation. When I first struck out on my own—prior to forming AMD—he was quick to offer my name and services to his contacts. I’ll never forget his kind, hand-written note, received when my father passed away so many years ago.
When I think of Stan, the first word that comes to mind is “integrity.” I learned a great deal from him by simply being in his company. Not long ago, I had the opportunity to visit with Stan and it seemed like we picked up right where we had left off—reminiscing about long-ago clients and projects as if it had all happened yesterday.
Thank you, Stan. I will be forever grateful for our friendship.
Today would have been Michael Brecker‘s 63rd birthday. A tenor saxophonist whose résumé includes stints with Frank Zappa, Sly and the Family Stone, and Miles Davis, Brecker was, according to his bio at allaboutjazz.com, “among the generation of jazz musicians that saw rock music not as the enemy but as a viable musical option.”
Here he is on his final album—released shortly after his death from leukemia in 2007—joined by Pat Metheny, Herbie Hancock, John Patitucci, and Jack DeJohnette:
[audio:https://helveticka.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/01-The-Mean-Time.mp3|titles=01 The Mean Time]As Archaeologists of the future sift through the shattered remains of our once great and glorious culture, they’ll no doubt wonder what in the Sam Hill happened to us.
This, that’s what.
Which reminds me of my ad agency days. We had a client who disallowed the use of the word but. Not in copy, not in headlines, not anywhere. Why? “Because,” he told us, unable to hide the exasperation—and impatience—in his voice. “It’s negative.”