The Little Words Mean the Most

Speaking to academics in Atlanta Friday

 

[one slide]

 

I am the devil’s spawn:

an advertising copywriter

trained to make sales.

These are dark arts.

 

always in the big type [my office Feb 2016]

Hey, Doris. About Trumpelstiltskin, in my view

 

Like you I cling to RCP polls and Nate Silver.

Like a lobster trawler clings to a heavy pot.

Donhole Trump as the last-standing Republican presidential candidate?

Moon shot to reach the center of the earth. No science supports the theory.

The mainstream Republicans have been vandalized. They just don't know it.

Trump is Sharpie-ing mustaches on the painting of Presidents. Look: eventually some jackass is always to blame. Trump will complete the post-graduate course the world is taking in contempt for the United States. And yes: that does matter. Politicians are the intellectually challenged cousins of how economies actually work.

I'm sorry: I just can't stop laughing at a Trump candidacy. It would be like electing the Blue Man Group to run "the greatest nation on earth." Trump is a Vegas act. Not a Secret Weapon. Remember the "buyer's remorse" a nation felt a few years after the woo-hoo! 2003 Iraq invasion?

Dear Trump & Iraq Invasion diehards: prepare to feel sick to your stomach yet again. Only now you've been stupid twice. Ooooh. Yuck. Tissue anyone?

The ONLY way Democrats could screw this up is by staying home and not voting. In my foggy view nine months from what matters, a lazy Democratic electorate is the Republicans' only real hope. Or their old tool: voter suppression. "Voter Fraud!" Of which there have been something like 2 cases in the last century, both certifiable.

Revenant Mom

 

[the outline]

 

Phone rings. "Tom Ahern."

"Mr. Ahern, I am sorry to bother you." A reassuring adult male voice, seemed. "Can I have a second of your time?" mmm "Not a sales call! Promise." Lower voice, weary voice it seemed to me. "Much more personal. We need your help."

yes?

"Can I ask, is your home town Holbrook, Massachusetts?"

yes?

"Here?" The caller gave me the exact address I'd lived at from infancy through high school, in a warm, well-fed, well-managed lower-middle-class starter home, built on the back of the GI Bill by my father, Private First Class Thomas F. Ahern, and his wife, Hazel née McKay. It was a small house. But it was well-insulated. From outside temperatures, other views and especially judgmental neighbors. Perish disgrace and shame.

yes? "Can I help you?"

Yes.

yes?

Yes. Well, here it is. Your mother is haunting our house. We want her out. And she seems to want to talk to you.

How committees write... (real life)

The following unretouched sample is fresh and REAL, emitted by one of Earth's most prestigious STEM universities, in good faith, written not by a single trained fundraiser's pen but instead by a distinguished Ph.D. committee of experts pretending to be salespeople ...

University Medicine is leading the biomedical revolution by defining and developing the next generation of care that is proactive, predictive, and precise. We will achieve the best health outcomes for every individual by bridging the gap between basic and clinical research and by transforming patient care through new and compassionate delivery models. University is one of the only places in the world where this vision of Ultimate Health can be attained, and paramount to this vision are investments in new scientific paradigms and in the emerging leaders who will pioneer these changes in medicine and health. This campaign will catalyze the resources of University to solve major issues in children’s health. And when healthy children become healthy adults, our community is stronger and healthier.

Grade level: 12 (nothing higher) / Reading ease: 32 out of 100

Optimal grade level: 9 or lower / Reading ease: 55 or higher

Well it could have been better ...

University Medicine is leading the biomedical revolution by jargon and jargon the next generation of care that is jargon, jargon, and jargon. We will achieve the best health jargon for every individual by jargon between jargon and jargon research and by jargon patient care through new and compassionate jargon. University is one of the only places in the world where this vision of jargon can be attained, and pompous to this vision are pompous in new scientific jargon and in the emerging leaders who will pioneer these changes in medicine and health. This campaign will jargon of University to solve major issues in children’s health. And when healthy children become healthy adults, our community is stronger and healthier.

OK for my new website? Losing perspex!

What I'm trying to do in a case, in case; who made it great? designer Andrea Hopkins turned it into a story; no one else like her

3 shows in San Antonio

Can I ever thank you enough, Jonathan Feist, for plucking me out of the white noise?

On the topic of DONATE buttons

Proposed: Colonial-period yoga

Down dog. Head pressed against a roaring fireplace screen, scorched black, bearing a pistol-drawn cowboy. It took 4 hours of fooling and feeding, with 3 kinds of pine cones, Concord grape vines, a cheater FIRESTARTER: getting the burn-geometry right. Horizontally. Moving to the teepee arrangement. Moving to Lincoln logs. Warmth. Steady. In control. Comforting. So I stretched. The fish is teaching me to arch my back.