It’s been so busy this week I didn’t get to tell you about Tuesday night, when I took a day off work and went to Royal Oak for May’s Mitten Movie Project, a monthly screening of short films. Our DFC class project was in it, and it got a few chuckles where it was supposed to, so I was happy.

But the highlight (for me, anyway) was a short by Mike Eshaq, “MT* Crib*: Arab American Style,” which was hysterical. (I’m obscuring the name of the cable channel’s well-known show in the title, just in case they have robo-goons out there looking for copyright violators. In the Q-and-A, I asked Eshaq how he got permission to use their name and graphics and he said, “Um, I didn’t.” So let’s keep it our secret.)

Anyway, a trip to Ali’s crib to see “how they kick it in East Dearborn” followed the template down to every jerky push zoom and quick-cut edit. The actors were all friends, it was a low/no-budget production, but it worked. The first big inside-the-house laugh featured Ali’s mother yelling downstairs in Arabic to make sure no one is sitting on her living-room couches. Talk about comedy as a unifying force; is there a single ethnic group in America where women don’t protect the living room with their lives? In the Snoop Dogg episode of this very series, there was a sign outside the living room: THIS IS NOT A KICK-IT ROOM. (There were signs everywhere in Snoop’s house, in fact. NO EATING IN THE STUDIO and CLEAN UP AFTER YOURSELF. Sometimes having an entourage is like being a Cub Scout den mother, I guess.) It wasn’t clear plastic furniture covers, but it was close.

The featured attraction seemed to be this; we watched all three episodes. The filmmaker wasn’t there — he’s off in L.A. establishing his showbiz career — so the stars came to the Q-and-A. I didn’t really have any questions for them; mine were all for the filmmaker, and they boiled down to “how the hell did you find room in your budget for a freakin’ helicopter,” but that was answered by someone sitting near me, who replied, “His parents are really rich,” and that was that.

The director of our little student production was there, and asked if I’d be game for a weekend filmmaking challenge associated with the Detroit-Windsor film festival next month. Here’s how it works: You assemble a team, and on Friday you’re given four elements — a location, a genre, a line of dialogue and a prop. You have until Sunday to turn in a short film (OK, video) incorporating all four, which are then screened for the crowd and judged for fabulous prizes that usually boil down to a couple hundred bucks. It actually sounds kind of fun. A veteran of one of these described his most recent experience; I forget the location, but the rest were action/adventure, “I’ll have to get back to you later” and a hat or something. “Don’t plan on getting much sleep,” he said. Deadline is a drug, as we all know. We might have to do this.

If nothing else, the making-of featurette will be a great video for NN.C.

So, a little bloggage:

Mitch Albom, man of the people, whines that the Wings are doing really well in the Western Conference NHL finals, and yet still there are empty seats at the Joe. Bad fans, bad! At last count, a hundred or so commenters had reminded him that the state is in a recession, and major-league sports tickets might be considered a luxury under such circumstances.

The Poor Man is back with a while new comics series — The Amazing League of Pundits. And it’s hilarious.

Something I didn’t know was happening: A few thoughts about eBay’s decline.

The scary thing about this new movie, Noise? Is that I identify so strongly. If I had a rocket launcher, some son-of-a-bitch with a gas-powered blower would die…

That’s it, folks. I have a doctor’s appointment in an hour to discuss a flare-up of my plantar fasciitis, and I think I’ll impress him with my commitment to fitness by riding my bike there. At this point, it hurts too much to walk.

You people, always wanting more, more, more. And here I spent the morning trying to sleep carefully hand-crafting a video amusement for you.

After you watch that, a li’l bloggage:

One of the bright spots in an otherwise damp afternoon was catching this on one of my many trips up and down the Nautical Mile: Alix Spiegel’s fascinating look at two toddlers with gender-identification issues. From NPR/All Things Considered. Please don’t be put off by any ooh-ick feelings you might have; this is as intelligent and sensitive a look at the subject as you can ask for. You know all those transgendered people who say, “I’ve felt like I had the wrong body since I was very young?” These are those very young people.

A little past its sell-by date, my ol’ pal Lance Mannion’s sketch of his life in Indiana.

Fresh meat, thrown to the ravening herd! Tear it apart!

Nothing like turning the page of your calendar and reading “boat in” on a day you’d totally forgotten about. So let’s make this an open discussion thread. It’s blog Calvinball — whoever has the ball gets to determine what the topic is. “But Nance,” you query. “Isn’t that the way it always is?” Why yes, but now it has a name — Blog Calvinball.

Take the talking stick and beat on someone with it (or don’t). I’ll be back this afternoon.

(On the off chance we have new readers today — an off chance because I stupidly forgot to plug NN.C in my shirttail yesterday — be advised that all new comments go to moderation first, but once you’re approved you’re in. So if you don’t see you comment right away, be patient.)

Some broad has a column about Indiana in the Washington Post. “What you need to know,” or something. It’s twinned with a piece by some guy writing the same thing about North Carolina. They both say their states are a mass of contradictions. Meh. I think they need to get better writers.

But this is it, Indiana — an extraordinary primary in this year of years, so drink it up. I was on the phone with Mark the Shark last week (I was on the phone with a few Hoosiers in the past week; see above), and he was reminiscing about the time he snuck out of lunch at Bishop Luers to see Robert Kennedy’s car drive past, the last time the Indiana primary mattered. Mark the Shark wears hearing aids now. The next time this happens, you could be dead. Drink. It. Up.

Then enjoy the familiar feeling of the day after, when your ardent lover of the past few weeks has moved on and now ignores your number on the caller ID. “Indiana who?” he or she will say, if you get through. “Oh yeah — one of those ‘I’ states.” Like …oh, Iowa.

During my chat with Paul Helmke, we talked about his famous Theory of Horizontal Stateitude, which I believe we’ve discussed here before. To wit: Ohio, Indiana and Illinois are three states divided the wrong way. The upper third of each has more in common with one another than the rest of their own territory, ditto the central and southernmost thirds. The north of each is blue-collar and ethnic (Cleveland, Gary, Chicago), the central a frontier of the Mid-Atlantic states (Columbus, Indianapolis, Springfield, the south a remnant of the Dixie/Appalachia that lies below. It’s an interesting theory, imperfect in parts, but sound as a whole. He reminded me of Indiana’s role in the 1920s-era KKK, which many people see as evidence of a deeply entrenched racism, but that’s too facile. The Klan’s big issue in the ’20s was anti-immigration and stamping out the menace of Popery. When they made a play to take over the state’s Republican party, it was the northern-third party members who put a stop to it.

He also reminded me of the influence of foreign policy on this insulated, heartland area. His family were all Democrats “until Woodrow Wilson invaded the Fatherland,” and all the good Germans turned Republican overnight. “And I’m hearing from a lot of Republicans who plan to vote Democratic in the fall,” he said, over disgust with the Iraq war. Goes to show you things change everywhere, even in Indiana.

So how are the rest of you on this fine spring day? Speaking of demographic and historical influences, I saw a bumper sticker the other day. It read: “Turkey: Take responsibility for the Armenian genocide,” which counts as a sentiment you don’t hear expressed much in other parts of the country. Yesterday, while poking around Sweet Juniper’s related sites, I ordered this from his photo store. It looks as thought it was taken in the Dequindre Cut pre-renovation, although I could be wrong. Title: “Feral dog, Albanian graffiti.” Yes, there’s an Albanian presence in Detroit. Yes, that’s the country where the fake war was in “Wag the Dog,” a place so reliably obscure the writers believed it could pass as “one of those ‘A’ countries,” and it did. Not here.

OK, enough half-assed sociology. On to the bloggage:

The 50 Greatest Commercial Parodies of all time might be funny, but I didn’t get beyond No. 50 — for Annuale, the once-a-year period. It seemed unfair to the other ad parodies to have to compare with that one. Love the pink ax.

A survey of newspaper editors around the world reveals they believe the newspaper of the future will be free (congratulations, folks, it already is); have more opinion and comment (groan, because of course they’re doing such a bang-up job competing with the internet on that one already); and that “some traditional editorial functions will be outsourced” (more errors). A limping industry falls into its future.

Celebrity “journalism” is great fun and all, but I miss the days when all we did was take Sean Penn’s picture when he was leaving a restaurant with Madonna. Poor Mischa Barton (a phrase I never thought I’d write).

For those of you who missed the Tom Cruise/Oprah interview last week, Bossy has a recap.

Off to the gym. Be good, now.

Another Kentucky Derby, another breakdown. Churchill Downs officials did what frequently happens when a horse is injured this badly in front of a worldwide television audience — drew trucks in a tight circle around her and euthanized her out of sight. Not that NBC seemed inclined to show it in the first place, as Sally Jenkins notes.

I love horses, I love (most) horsemen, but people? When the most famous horse race in the world features two hideous life-ending accidents in three years, the world is telling you something, and it’s not, “You’re having a run of bad luck.”

Some years ago the Atlantic ran a fascinating story about the American Kennel Club, and how it’s ruining dogs. You may disagree with its basic premise, but it raised some fascinating questions about what, exactly, constitutes a breed. The example they used was Dalmatians, which have a chronic, genetic stomach defect. It’s on a recessive gene, and breeders have found that if you breed a Dalmatian out to an English spaniel (maybe a setter; memory’s not what it used to be), which looks like a long-haired version of a Dalmatian, the defect disappears. Breed those pups back to Dalmatians, and within two or three generations you have puppies that look and behave exactly like any other Dalmatian, but are free of the genetic defect. Alas, the AKC considers these dogs mongrels. Why? Because they’re not purebred.

Thoroughbreds (which is an actual breed, not a designation like “purebred”) are among the most inbred horses in the world. Every single one goes back to three foundation sires, and nearly all the ones racing today can call Native Dancer some form of great-great grandpappy. Students of racing have noted the bloodline seems to be at a plateau — records haven’t moved much since Secretariat’s day 35 years ago, and that was before a lot of technical and pharmaceutical advances Secretariat’s team couldn’t take advantage of. Big Brown, the winner yesterday, has a history of hoof bruising, and runs in glue-on shoes over silicone pads. Think what you’d rather run a bruising mile-and-a-quarter in — wingtips or Nikes. That’s the comparison.

No one has written better about racing in recent years than Jane Smiley, novelist and horsewoman, who has campaigned several racehorses and rides herself. Her post on the NYT blog yesterday was instructive; she thinks the problem is in footing, not breeding, and notes the sharp drop in catastrophic accidents in California, once that state gave up dirt for a synthetic surface called polytrack. Europe has far few injuries than the U.S. does as well, and runs on grass. Jenkins puts the blame on inbreeding and overtraining. They’re both probably at least partly right; it’s a complicated problem without easy answers. Just for the hell of it, though, I’d like to see some discussion of breeding a little more sturdiness into the line. The breed’s been around for 300 years or so — can we add one more ingredient to the stew? Maybe a dash of Dutch Warmblood, something with a bit more iron in the leg. Partisans will tell you a horse so bred wouldn’t be a thoroughbred, and if you’re going to split hairs, I guess it wouldn’t be. But then, maybe the next discussion might be to open up racing to non-thoroughbreds. Why not? If thoroughbreds are superior, they’ll win all the races, and maybe the ones bred for a little extra bone heft will retain their speed and lose the glass ankles. This is a speed competition, not a dog show.

Otherwise, if this happens again in another year or two or three, well — it’s going to be a major mellow-harsher. Whenever it does, there’s a lot of mournful talk about how much these horses “love” their job, and how they wouldn’t be happy if they couldn’t race, etc. It’s anthropomorphic, of course; horses, all horses, do their jobs because it’s in their nature to cooperate, and do what’s asked of them. I never watched a 900-pound horse carry a 90-pound kid around a course of fences without marveling that he — the horse — allows it at all. They’re pleasers by nature, and we project our dreams of glory onto them, not the other way around. People watch the Kentucky Derby for the beauty of the animals, the loveliness of the spectacle, “My Old Kentucky Home.” They want the taste of bourbon in their mouths. Not blood.

OK, then.

Newcomer to the blogroll: Sweet Juniper, Detroiter, responsible for the infamous Detroit Public Schools book depository photos seen everywhere on the ‘nets these past few months. An urban life/parenting blogger with a gifted pen and an equally gifted eye. The graffiti pictures at Dequindre Cut are especially recommended. If you have a little time, read his explainer on how the books got that way.

A funny read from the WashPost, which asks the question, right there in the subhed: How much about your teenage transgressions should you tell your kids? The lede:

SOME MONTHS BACK, I was invited to a party with 20 or so other mothers. It was a wine-and-cheese affair, ladies only: The hostess had evacuated her husband and kids to the mall. Gathered around her dining room

table, we talked about our children, and then a few of the women began reminiscing about their own youths, comparing the transgressions they’d committed in their teens and 20s and debating whose were the most egregious.

“I win, I win!” one mother exclaimed. “I was a stripper!”

Can’t beat that, girls.

If you haven’t seen them yet, scroll down for Brian Stouder’s pix of Barack Obama’s visit to the Fort yesterday. Of course I missed it. It’s my curse.

However, a lovely day is in progress right outside. Time to go exploring with the Flip.

Guess where Brian spent his Sunday? Eating lunch with Barack Obama in Headwaters Park, that’s where:

The Obama campaign actually put on a picnic, with grilled brats and barbecued chicken and bottled water and chips and canned pop – and they had so much stuff that everyone who stood in the food line got served (and hundreds and hundreds of people lined up). Whatever they spent on the spread, they got their money’s worth; it was quite impressive!

Thanks for the pix, Brian.

Did somebody break the Internet last night? Half my favorite sites are down or refuse to load past the background/flag/one obnoxious ad stage. Gonna have to wing it today. Probably just as well, because today is the last day of my Giant Wad of Text project, and I still have quite a lot to chew. So let’s just do an utterly stupid post today.

The other day I was glowering at myself in the mirror — every day, I give you another chance to wake up transformed into utter beauty, and every day you disappoint me — when I noticed my glower line is pretty much permanent now:

In some ways, it’s not so bad. I finally figured out why I like “The Departed” so much. It’s like looking
into a mirror:

Hard to imagine critics once thought Leo DiCaprio was too pretty to play real grown-up parts. (Leo, artist-to-artist: They said the same thing about me.) The transforming effect of the glower!

Some call the mark of the glower a “frown line.” Nah. It’s concentration, although lately, it’s the look I wear pretty much permanently when reading the news. For instance:

A prostitution ringleader kills herself rather than face eight years in prison. Her clients remain, among other places, in the U.S. Senate.

Here’s another: On the five-year anniversary of the Mission Accomplished farce, the president’s spokesman suggests an edit for the infamous banner: “President Bush is well aware that the banner should have been much more specific and said ‘mission accomplished’ for these sailors who are on this ship on their mission.”

Glower, glower.

Gas prices soar beyond the clouds, customers start buying small, more-fuel efficient cars, and Detroit? Is caught mostly unprepared.

Glower.

Giant wad of text, still unwritten?

Glower.

Bloggage:

Looks like “did you really call your wife a cunt” has replaced “when did you stop beating her” as the neutron bomb of candidate questions. Defense strategy’s the same: Get huffy, refuse to answer.

See ya.

It’s standard for parents of children my age to mourn the loss of their Widdle Girl, as the less-widdle adolescent begins to make her appearance. And, truth be told, I sometimes take out the box of baby pictures and get a little wistful. Mostly, though, I look on a successful passage out of elementary-school as an affirmation that at least we made it this far. And then we work, again, on those pesky time-telling skills.

I missed this story when it went around a couple weeks ago: Columnist Lenore Skenazy, who lives in New York City, did a shocking thing.

Skenazy recently left her 9-year-old son, Izzy, at Bloomingdale’s in midtown Manhattan with a Metrocard for the subway, a subway map, $20, and told him she’d see him when he got back home.

And guess what? He made it. But Skenazy suffered a few wounds of her own:

As she wrote in her column about Izzy’s big adventure: “Half the people I’ve told this episode to now want to turn me in for child abuse. As if keeping kids under lock and key and helmet and cell phone and nanny and surveillance is the right way to rear kids. It’s not. It’s debilitating — for us and for them.”

Izzy had been bugging his mom for a while to let him try it. The reaction was predictable; Skenazy anointed herself America’s Worst Mother afterward, and I get the sense she was waiting to do so. But so what? I, as America’s Second-Worst Mother, salute her.

Say what you want about Michael Moore, and “Bowling for Columbine” might have been mean to poor old Charlie Heston, but he hit on a very important truth in that movie, and hardly anyone talked about it: Americans are constantly spoon-fed a diet of Fear, and it shows in the decisions they make, including how they raise their kids.

One day last winter, I called Kate at a friend’s house, a friend who lives one (1) block away. I’m sitting at my bedroom window now, and if there weren’t a house in the way, I could see this friend’s house. I told her it was time to come home. Two minutes later, headlights swung into the driveway — my neighbor, dropping Kate off.

Later I said, “Please, just let her walk home. It’s one block. She won’t freeze.” I assumed Kate had asked for a ride because it was cold outside. But no: “Oh, really, I don’t mind. If anything happened to her, I’d never forgive myself.” The chances of something happening in one block are, as Skenazy points out, about the same as being struck by lightning, but ah well.

“What do we pay outrageous taxes for, if not for safety?” I replied. She pointed out that taxes don’t buy safety, and she’s right. But fear doesn’t, either. Sometimes you just have to take your chances in the world. Paul Campos, a Rocky Mountain News columnist, wrote of Skenazy:

Skenazy notes that one acquaintance told her that he requires his daughter to call home after she has walked the one block to her friend’s house, even though they live in a typically crime-free suburb.

Other parents informed her they don’t allow their children to walk alone to the mailbox.

This kind of thing encourages children to see the world in fear-ridden terms, and to grow up to become the sort of people more interested in having their government protect them from largely imaginary threats than in preserving their civil liberties.

Here’s Rod Dreher, the banner-carrying Crunchy Conservative, a man whose very existence is defined by fear and whining, showing his faith in his fellow man:

John Podhoretz told me once that growing up in NYC in the big bad Seventies, he used to take the subway around by himself when he was not much older than Matthew is now. And that that wasn’t unusual. Nowadays, though, you’d be out of your mind to let your kid do that in NYC, which is vastly safer than it used to be. Or if not out of your mind, at least that kind of behavior would be extremely unusual.

This was in the midst of a big post about how his own children can’t go around the neighborhood unsupervised, but can in his Louisiana hometown. (For some years now, Dreher’s been threatening to go off the grid and retreat to a plot of organically farmed land, to encase his family in the warm cotton batting of no television and homeschooling. I wish he’d just pull the trigger and put the rest of us out of our misery.) Note the twisted logic: John Podhoretz navigated the city safely when it was far more dangerous. Now it’s far, far safer, but if you let your kids do it today, “you’d be out of your mind.”

I live in a suburb so safe that the vandalism of a For Sale sign makes the newspaper. (Seriously: The headline was “Sign bent.”) I may live to regret it, but just for today, I’m going to assume my taxes buy something other than potholes and lousy city government. Fly free, little bird.

(Oh, and about those time-telling skills: Of course Kate can tell time. She just loses track of it. One condition to the freedom I give her is, she has to be home on time. Inevitably, she forgets.)

More on America’s Worst Mother, and her blog, Free Range Kids, where you can read the column that started it all.

So, bloggage:

While we’re on the subject, I wasn’t offended by Miley Cyrus’ back, either.

God bless America? No, god DAMN America! And John McCain asked for his endorsement.

My Indiana alma mater’s circulation: 24,196. One-year drop? More than eight percent. I confess, my jaw dropped.

Back to work.