Word of the Year

Having worked closely with Webster's New World, I know well that it is the dictionary of choice, and I am reluctant to provide publicity to its rival from Springfield, MA.

However, there is indeed no doubt that the word of 2008 is bailout!

Harvard - Yale

As David Brooks says in the NYT, "If a foreign enemy attacks the United States during the Harvard-Yale game any time over the next four years, we’re screwed . . . "

(not that I think most of these people are the type who attend college football games).

And, by the way, we beat Yale 10-0 earlier today. As the Patriot Ledger commented, the frostbite afternoon wasn’t going to stop the home team. I wouldn't say it was the coldest I have ever been but it was very very chilly, especially once the sun disappeared. My friend Lamar, up from South Carolina for 24 hours, kept speculating on the actual temperature which almost made it worse. We had great seats, thanks to my very first employers, Alice and Marty Gordon, who had to go to San Diego for the weekend.

It was a nice moment when the scoreboard showed Senator Kennedy, sitting with his friend and teammate former Senator John Culver of Iowa, enjoying the game.

Cambridge Landmarks

Terrible news about everyone's favorite newsstand!

The Game

It's time for The Game! It's the 125th Harvard-Yale game as well as the 40th anniversary of the famous 29-29 tie!

Mad Men

I finally had a few hours to catch up on the last few episodes of Mad Men, which I find quite fascinating. In some ways the characters are hard to identify with (although I am always amused by John Slattery, whom I liked years ago in Homefront - remember, Linda Metcalf met him at her factory and thought he had a crush on her but he really liked her mother and eventually married the mother - and I only recently learned he went to St. Sebastian's, the brother school of the school I went to for junior high) but the show is very skillful at creating sympathy for every character in turn, even the fascinating but infuriating Don Draper! However, until the final episode, I had not realized that Peggy, the Brooklyn born heroine had begun to catch up with Don in ambition and vision, and it was a very clever way to end the season.

How interesting that GQ has picked four incredibly different men as its men of the year: Obama, Leonardo DiCaprio, Michael Phelps and Jon Hamm! Why DiCaprio? I know Revolutionary Road is getting a lot of buzz but it hasn't even opened yet!

Retail Therapy

Oh dear, this is me!

Post Election

Gail Collins gets my vote for as NYT columnist of the year, in part for writing as funny as this:

Americans are going through election withdrawal, trying to adjust to life without poll numbers. Really, we’ve heard quite a bit of whining on this subject lately.

But there’s still Minnesota! The U.S. Senate race there is up in the air. You may want to consider becoming totally obsessed with it, jumping out of bed every morning and racing to the computer to check for the latest vote count.

Or perhaps not. Still, it’s something to hang on to.

There are actually three Senate races that are undecided, and if the Democrats won them all, they’d hit the magic filibuster-proof number of 60. Alaska, determined to continue in its role as the vortex of all things politically strange, still hasn’t counted tens of thousands of ballots. Georgia has a Senate runoff Dec. 2, and the Democrats have dispatched tons of canvassers to help their candidate, Jim Martin. Martin is a long shot, but we should all be grateful that they’ve found something to do with the Obama campaign workers, who would otherwise have been set loose to wander the country, muttering about change and attempting to register household pets to vote.

What's in a name?

New acquaintance: "Constance . . . as in . . ." he hesitates.

I wait expectantly.

"As in English class!" he finishes triumphantly.

Not sure what exactly he had in mind!

He turned out to be a Tarheel fan, so two strikes against him.

If You Were President ...

Help Obama pick his Cabinet! Although I can't imagine Hillary taking a job in this administration, unless perhaps it was a Supreme Court nomination. As yet, the only Cabinet position I feel strongly about is Secretary of State; since my brother works for the State Department, I do think it could be potentially helpful to have the Secretary be someone he interned for in high school (although it would have been better had Kerry been elected in the first place, obviously)! I think Obama owes John Kerry any position he wants, having first provided the opportunity for him to become a household word at the Democratic Convention.

Colin Powell once judged a chili contest for youthful members of the Foreign Service, then told them he wished he could stay to eat it with them but was expected at the White House for lunch! As I recall, my brother thought he said it with real regret.

Goodbye and good riddance

Katha Pollitt says goodbye to Sarah Palin! I like the part about "the kids named after bays and sports and trees and airplanes and who did not seem to go to school at all." How is Bristol going to be able to home school that baby if she can't even finish high school?

Happy Halloween!

Can you imagine a cuter ladybug than my youngest niece on her first birthday?

First Dog

Now that Obama has been elected president, the first order of business is to find the right puppy for his daughters, and apparently the whole country is weighing in...

"Most advised going to a shelter, as the Obamas have said they intend to do. 'As a volunteer at the local shelter, I think it would be a great message to the country about the benefits of adopting a dog, and I like the political spin that in America, any dog can make it to the White House,' one wrote."

Sympathy for a Fellow Migraine Sufferer

Here is a heartbreaking story about a professional musician who suffers from migraines and went to the emergency room of a Vermont hospital eight years ago. This had happened before and, as on other occasions, she was given a painkiller and another med to treat the nausea brought on by the first drug. One thing, however, was unusual about this visit - the nausea med was administered differently. And the incident eventually caused Levine, a professional musician, to lose her right arm below the elbow. She later filed a lawsuit against Wyeth, which sells the injectable Phenergan nausea med.

Levine won a $6.8 million trial verdict that was upheld by the Vermont Supreme Court but the case was appealed to the Supreme Court by the pharmaceutical company. Today the Supreme Court is hearing Oral Argument on the issue of federal preemption of state tort law in Wyeth v. Levine, in a case considered to have long term applications toward business.

What a nice gesture!

BOSTON - All is forgiven for more than 50,000 children who use the Boston Public Library.
The library will waive all the fines and lost book charges rung up by the children on Saturday. Boston Mayor Thomas Menino and Boston Public Library President Amy Ryan will summon a magician to make the fees "disappear"

I feel as if I should check my shelves...

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Miss Manners

Dear Miss Manners:

What's your beef with a cash bar at wedding receptions? Weddings are incredibly expensive, and a couple starting out shouldn't have to go in the hole for thousands of dollars just to throw a reception where Miss Manners and a bunch of other deadbeats can have unlimited liquor. I thought you were a classy broad!
If we should encounter each other at a wedding reception, then your first drink will be on me, and you can hustle the rest yourself! I DARE YOU TO PRINT THIS!

Suppose you go first and explain why anyone would want to stage a thousands-of-dollars event for people whom they think of as deadbeats, and why other people would want to attend the wedding of those who thought that of them. This will give Miss Manners a moment to think of a tactful way of saying that she does not care to drink with you.

I do love Miss Manners!