Links-a-plenty, today:

I swear, I’m going to stop reading The Poor Man for the Golden Winger and Keyboard Kommandos and start reading it for the occasional mixed grills of links. Is Bill Frist’s family biography actually called “Good People Beget Good People”? Evidently. The reader reviews are hilarious:

This is a fascinating study of the extraordinary mix of in-breeding, animal sacrifice, and corruption required to produce the world’s worst human being. Coming from a family of mildly despicable cheats, the Frists had a leg up on normal human beings…but it still took an enormous amount of laboratory work and careful training to produce not just a self-involved twit but an unspeakable monster.

Snork.

The News reminds us that we’re creeping up on the 30th anniversary of? (Cue the Gordon Lightfoot tune!) Yes, the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald. You’ll recall, from having the song burned into your memory that the “musty old hall in Detroit” where they prayed, was the Maritime Sailors’ Cathedral — hence, Ground Zero for the remembrances. Evidently they still ring the bell 29 times, “for each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald,” plus one more time for all sailors lost in the Great Lakes.

But the man who made the wreck famous around the world won’t be there: Yet Lightfoot, who has attended memorial services in Michigan in the past, believes out of respect for the family members that it’s “time to put this ship to rest,” according to his business manager in Toronto, Barry Harvey of Early Morning Productions.

I have a friend who lives up there in the U.P., in the Les Cheneaux islands. The islands are an archipelago in northern Lake Huron; the name means “the channels,” and the area provides inland-type boating waters. Not that night — November 10, 1975. My friend said the waves in the channel that runs past their cottage were so high you didn’t dare cross it even in a fairly sturdy Chris Craft, and this was water you could ski on, most days. It was a weak version of a hurricane that night, only with snow.

I don’t read The Corner for a number of good reasons. Roy Edroso reminds me why.

And now to work.

Remember when sneakers came out with those twinkly lights in the soles, and before they went to the market they belonged in — toddlers and pre-schoolers — for a while actual adults wore them? OK. Some years ago, in Fort Wayne, police were chasing an armed robber who was wearing those things. He tried to foil his pursuers by jumping out of his car and making his escape cross-country through a recently harvested farm field. After all, it was dark! He could just slip into the inky rural night and be gone!

Oops.

From the same file: Criminals whose fashion choices trip them up. In this case, literally.

Whoever said funerals were for the living sure got that one right. Rosa Parks’ was carried on live TV today, and the last time I checked — about 5:30 p.m. — it was still going on.

It started at noon.

Bill Clinton was one of the first speakers. He said he couldn’t stay for the rest of the service because he had to go back to New York and work on getting poor people better health care, and that’s something Mrs. Parks would have approved of. He got a big round of applause. That guy kills me; he has the most effortless people patter I’ve ever seen. I think most of what makes Republicans hate him so much is because — follow me closely here — he’s so likable.

I personally like him because he doesn’t say “tair” instead of “terror,” but that’s me. Actually, I’m feeling rather nostalgic about the whole Clinton era. My job was secure, my bosses were pleasant, my house payment low. At the beginning of it, I married Alan. In the middle of it, a charming little baby appeared in my life. At the end, the new millennium arrived with thrilling fireworks around the world and for a while you could almost believe things were going to stay swell for a good long while.

Just confirms my initial impulse of pessimism in all things. Sooner or later, it’s welcome to the suck.

I owned Knight Ridder stock in the Clinton era, too — a lot of it (for me, anyway). It was never a great performer, but I got it at a 15 percent employee discount and bought it through payroll deduction, so it piled up. I sold every last share to buy this house, which has no doubt declined in value since the papers were signed and Economic Apocalypse Soon opened in the Metro Detroit area. Maybe the bad blood of KR seed money cursed the place, I dunno. But of course it’s something I wish I still owned, because things may well get interesting for KR very soon:

With many Knight Ridder employees still emptying their desks in the wake of the latest round of layoffs, company executives found themselves faced with potential pink slips of their own this week, courtesy of the company’s biggest shareholder, Private Capital Management. PCM warned the Knight Ridder board Tuesday that if it fails to take its advice and sell the company, PCM will likely lead an effort to get rid of current board members and executives and sell off Knight Ridder assets to the highest bidder.

In other words, it’s possible that, for the first time ever, it might pay pretty well to own KR stock — and if you’re an employee, that’s good, because you may need to sell it soon.

One thing the last few years have taught me: Never, ever say “it can’t get any worse.” It can always get worse. And frequently does.

But I don’t want to bring you down. Let’s leap to the bloggage:

One man’s fashion misstep, recounted amusingly on eBay. And apparently the auction made the seller famous.

Sometimes when you follow all the little links at The Poor Man, you wind up in the strangest places. If you’re not feeling queasy at the moment (I was when I read this, alas), page through the Hall of Fame. My favorite is the Hook ’em Horns guy, which sort of captures, in one picture, my feelings about Texas.

I have the beginnings of a raging head cold. I’m going to bed early with a mug of Throat Coat. Carry on.

Apparently the bugaboo of “info” is kicking back a lot of comments in the newspaper survey thread. I also heard from someone who got booted for “online.com.” Try “data,” or do the filter-busting trick of “1nf0” or some such.

Sorry about this.

Thanks to all who are participating in the newspaper-readership survey, below. After reading most of the responses to John Scalzi’s, I can’t say any part of it was all that shocking, but some parts were surprising. The no-more-trash argument against dead-tree versions of the paper never occurred to me, and I am a person who risks a hernia every time I take my recycling to the curb. I guess I’ve been living with newsprint piles so long they’re just part of the furniture.

Here’s what I fear losing when the print newspaper goes away — the surprise. There’s something about the experience of holding broadsheet in your hands, turning the pages, scanning the story array, lingering here, passing by there. I read the Sunday paper on the living room couch and Alan reads it in a family-room easy chair. The rooms are adjacent, and we sometimes talk back and forth about this story or that. The breakfast table gets a bit crowded sometimes, but I simply can’t imagine eating breakfast without a paper. What — you make conversation at that hour? Before the coffee? Don’t think so.

And then there’s the surprise, the hey-Martha story, the I-didn’t-know-that story. Some people find being confronted with material they’re not interested in is a waste of time. I don’t. There’s always something there that I didn’t know I was interested in, and it turns out I was.

I recall a conversation, some years back, with someone rhapsodizing over how wonderful it will be when the electronic newspaper becomes, basically, a clipping service, customized for every reader. All the stories will interest you! How wonderful!

Well, maybe not. When Google comes up with an algorithm for the surprise story, I’ll bite. Until then, I’m taking my chances on the newsprint.

I confess: I’ve been watching HBO’s “Rome.” You need to say it like the actors, though, with a British accent and that extra-long O: I’ve been watching “Roooome.” And Roooome is growing on me.

It took me a while to get into, but it’s paying off. I needed to do some outside reading, but I get it all now, I think: Most of the characters are based upon real people, but the two central ones — a pair of soldiers named Lucius Vorenus and Titus Pullo — are not. They sort of amble through the narrative like Zelig, turning up at key points in Roman history, as in episode 2, called “How Titus Pullo Brought Down the Republic.”

But that was nothing compared to Ep. 8, “Caesarion,” in which T.P. is presented as a good bet for father of Cleopatra’s son, ostensibly by Julius Caesar. Of course this was preceded by some hot Roman soldier-on-Egyptian princess loooove action (otherwise it wouldn’t be HBO, you know). Titus Pullo is quite the jolly hunk, and I’m beginning to understand the eternal erotic appeal of leather miniskirts — on guys, anyway.

They kind of stack the deck in T.P.’s favor, though — he gets all the good lines. Buying a prostitute for a young charge’s first time, he balks at the price, then pays it, saying, “The girl better f*ck like Helen of Troy with her ass on fire, or I’ll know the reason.”

Drop that one at your next cocktail party.

John Scalzi did this over on his site, out of curiosity, he says. Well, the next big writing project I have to do involves this very topic, so I’ll do it for every journalist’s favorite reason: To avoid doing the work myself.

Kidding. I’m actually curious, too. So here we go:

1) Do you subscribe to a daily newspaper? (If you have an online subscription that you pay for, include that, too, but tell me if it’s online.)

2) Why or why not?

3) If you don’t subscribe, what could get you to do so? If you do, what would make you drop your subscription?

Leave your answer in the comments. (This is actually tangential to what I’m writing, but it’s still interesting to me.)

Oh, and my answers:

1) Yes, the WSJ and NYT daily. I read the hometown papers online and buy them on the newstand on the days I’m out.

2) Because I’m a reader of all things, including blogs.

3) I’d drop both if either daily-delivered paper made significant cuts — that is, cuts I would notice — in their coverage.

Fuller discussion to follow.

Man, Detroit is a trip sometimes. Big story today in the News, about the train wreck waiting to happen with the city’s absentee ballots. It’s the usual misery:

Among findings by News reporters were ballots cast by people registered to vote at abandoned and long-demolished buildings; a master voter list with 380,000 incorrect names and addresses — including people who have died or moved out of the city; and a practice of hand-delivering ballots from senior citizens and disabled voters that were filled out in private meetings with Currie’s paid election workers. If the mayoral race came down to a close vote demanding a recount of absentee ballots, the result could be chaotic.

But this is the we’re-not-in-Kansas-anymore graf:

Currie refused to explain any of the problems uncovered by The News or outlined in court cases. She, along with her deputy, Vernon Clark, denied there are any problems with the vote in Detroit.

“Prove it,” Currie said. “P-R-O-V-E.”

Long weekend, although productive. Alan got the garage rearranged and I got a jump on the basement. (It was Take Responsibility for a Domestic Dumping Ground Saturday here, evidently.) Then we picked up Kate at yet another birthday party — they never end — and headed off to the little d, Defiance, Ohio, for the annual Halloween parade.

I can report: It was long (90 minutes), but there were marching bands, Shriners in Corvairs and much candy to be had. And while there were too many boring entries, at one point I saw a man approaching at the front of yet another unit, blowing a ram’s horn.

“This is what? Defiance’s newest synagogue?” I asked. Hardly. It was some evangelical Christian fellowship, which irritated me. Give the Jews back their shofar and get your butt out of the Halloween parade, I say. If you’re not willing to march in a devil mask and show you have an actual sense of humor, vamoose. But it was late in the parade and that might have been the 40-degree temperatures talking.

Also, I couldn’t help but notice how many home health-care equipment services there are in Defiance. (Their entry tended to be people riding motorized scooters in formation.) But then, we were surrounded by smokers — even outside, it was like sitting in a bar — and so oxygen delivery is probably a stable business.

So, the bloggage: Ali, bomaye! On this date in 1974, Muhammed Ali beat George Foreman in Kinshasa, Zaire, aka the Rumble in the Jungle. Not only that, it sparked a great documentary, “When We Were Kings,” which I can’t recommend highly enough.

Neglect your website for a while, and your karma comes looking for you. People start sending you things that remind you how kind the universe can be, sometimes.

Behold, my very own Nancy doll, seen here with her accompanying signed, suitable-for-framing Nancy comic strip. The doll is signed, too, although you can’t see that (you have to push up her dress; yes, she’s wearing undies). Thanks to regular reader and sometime commenter First-Time Caller, who is also Lance Mannion’s sister-in-law, and a very nice person who is evidently acquainted with Guy Gilchrist, who inherited the strip from the ghost of Ernie Bushmiller, or some such.

I’m so touched. My very own Nancy! I plan to cuddle her whenever I need an idea. I’m surre she’ll bring me luck.

Thanks, First-Time Caller.

So we’re having an exciting election season here in the the GP Geto, aka Da Woods. By “exciting,” I mean “contested.” That doesn’t happen much here, I gather. Not only does the 15-year incumbent mayor face a challenger, there are something like three candidates running for a single open council seat. The mayoral challenger came to a neighborhood picnic last summer, so I got a sense of her, but everyone else is terra incognita.

Of course, as a newcomer and a journalist, I’m looking forward to coverage in the local weekly. Two weeks ago, they informed us the endorsements would be coming in the following issue, and then dropped this bomb: “It’s our policy to endorse incumbents except in extraordinary circumstances.” Ohhh-kay. That’s helpful.

So the endorsements came out, and guess what? There were no extraordinary circumstances. Of the three rookies shooting for the open seat, their pick was the guy who most reminded them of the incumbents. What’s worse, in dismissing the mayoral challenger they made vague reference to an incident that happened some years back, with little explanation of the event and none of the context.

Because no one ever moves here, I guess, and so no need to give any background.

Thank God for the Free Press. All you gotta do is explain it.

And as “contested” as things get here in the ‘burbs, it’s nothing compared to Detroit. You want to know what the race card looks like? Like this.

If you grew up in central Ohio, I guarantee that you read the headline for today’s entry with a little swing in your head. That’s because it was part of a jingle for a local carpet store: Call Mr. Edwards, call Mr. Edwards, call Mr. Edwards — at Rite Rug! It ran for years and years and years on Columbus TV and radio stations, the singers always kicking in at the very end of the ad, followed by the phone number.

(Here’s how old I am: When I first heard this commercial, the number was CApitol 8, etc. If I sat and thought about it for a while, I could probably remember the last four digits.)

There was another guy on local TV in Columbus, who pitched for Giant Don’s Furniture Warehouse. My dad sold furniture (wholesale; he was a manufacturers rep), so I paid particular attention to these. I wondered why dad’s sales pitch never included ponies, which you got if you bought a “living-room suit,” or a second room of furniture for only NINE CENTS. That’s right, I said NINE CENTS.

Well. Wherever you grew up, you can describe the local commercials. So I was interested in this WashPost story on how even locally produced commercials are fading away.

Homegrown commercials — for personal injury lawyers, vocational schools, regional car dealerships and the like — are still numerous, of course, but a disappointing sobriety and professionalism has crept in over the years.

I was particularly sorry to read that one of Kate’s favorites is, alas, not local:

And then there’s a whole group of commercials that only look local. Those Empire Carpet ads with the lost-in-time jingle (“800 . . . 5-8-8, 2, three-hundred! Em-pire. Today!”) and the amazingly antiquated animation come from a company based in the Chicago area that uses the same ads in more than two dozen cities.

Deliberately badly made, local commercials have a way of scorching their way into your brain, either through horror or repetition. When Columbus got cable (and our household didn’t), we were introduced to Kash Amburgy, of Kash’s Big Bargain Barn, South LEB-A-NON, A-hi-a: “Remember, if Kash don’t sell, Kash don’t eat!” We made a pilgrimage there when I was in high school. A lesser Amburgy gave us a plastic bicentennial candy dish, in honor of our long trip. (If he knew why we were so giggly, he didn’t let on.)

The story’s a great read, but I have to say, some local TV ads endure in their horrifying glory. You need to see some of Geoffrey Feiger’s ads to believe them. And the other personal-injury lawyers who advertise are pretty amusing, too. I never knew dog-bite settlements were such big business here.

Mr. Edwards has a website now. Share your local-TV stories in the comments.

One final note: I HAVE to shop at this place:

Among other images, Ranger Surplus uses a brief stock clip of a nuclear explosion in its commercials. Its spokesman, Captain Happy, wears sunglasses and a Smokey the Bear hat and reminds viewers “to carry a knife. . . . You’ll never realize its many uses until you have one on you!”

The chain’s unusual ad slogan — “This store is the cat’s ass” — was a bit of a fluke, says Kramer. A customer uttered it spontaneously during the taping of a testimonial ad five years ago, and it stuck. Now it’s a badge of honor, appearing on T-shirts and bumper stickers. “People stick their heads in the store and shout it out,” says Kramer proudly.

Well, I would, too.

Let’s check the weather forecast for today. Was it overcast, chilly and spitting rain? Check. Was there a brisk wind blowing out of the northeast with regular leaf-scattering gusts? Check. Did the mercury barely top 50? Oh, yes.

Well, sounds like a great day to take the boat out of the water, then!

So that’s what we did. Truth to tell, it wasn’t too bad. We are outdoorsy people, and a spitting, chill rain is nothing. We sucked it up and froze to death. And at the end of the day the Mary M was dismasted, stripped of its fittings, put on a cradle and ready to be tarped and tucked away for a long winter’s nap.

Next spring: A new name. The leading candidate: Lush Life.

I noticed lots of boat names today. Motion Granted — unimaginative lawyer at the helm. D-i-i-i-i-g! Hello, fellow jazz fan. And, of course, more evidence lots of people in the world hate their jobs: Therapy. Quittin’ Time. And, of course, Blowin’ Deadline.

So that was today: Chapped hands, wept-off mascara and cocktail-party-level sociological observations.

The other day, at a photo shoot, I kicked back with the photographer’s new issue of Esquire, and read most of the story referenced here. Yes, it was called “Idiot America,” and I put it down thinking “I wish I’d read this in a newspaper, but of course that will never happen, because newspapers don’t want to offend anyone, especially people who would be considered idiots under the terms of this article.”

You should read it. It’s about evolution, sorta.