Radiohead’s “Creep,” performed by the Vega Choir of Sweden, has been burning up the Internet like a match on a gasoline-soaked haystack. Hit Play and scroll down this page and find out what’s going on with Vega Choir’s “Creep.” What is “Creep”? “Creep” is a song by English band Radiohead that was released in...
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What to call these men who, in decades past, did fearsome things for a purpose and did so with utter aplomb?  While dangerously close to yes men, the term yestermen works for me. He’s the man who saves the woman from falling off of Mt. Rushmore–all without taking off his tie.  The polar opposite...
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I have long been suspicious of the word Realtor, Realtor®, REALTOR®, or whatever it is. It began years ago when I noticed that the National Association of Realtors stressed that they were called the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® and that their members were obviously called…REALTORS® That’s right. All caps and with the registered trademark...
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Recently, I read an Associated Press assessment of how the American suburbs are no longer “your father’s suburbs of the 1950s and 1960s” and have become educated communities with vibrant arts scenes, and where Brazilian grocers and Vietnamese nail salons reside joyfully next to one another. Civic leaders in the city of Shawnee and...
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My riff on the word “vibrant” comes from my Shit I’m Always Trying to Figure Out article, but now I feel that it needs its own place. My question is this:  Why is the word “vibrant” a term loaded with political implications that is often used when the writer really wants to say “squalid”?...
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My son Lucas, when he was 2 1/2 years old, began speaking like an actor in a Merchant Ivory movie. “Merchant Ivory” refers to a film production company established in 1963 which filmed covers of high-falutin’ texts from Henry James, E.M. Forster, and others.  Interestingly enough, James Ivory was born in the decidedly un-high-falutin’...
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Is the phrase “the year 2000″ or, more widely, “the year 20XX,” lost to history forever?  I believe it is–except preserved in old movies and TV shows. Before 2000 rolled around, people almost always referred to this future event as “the year two-thousand.” I remember wondering, pre-2000, if people would continue that usage. They...
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