Good evening, 919 Gang. We do like a “local boy makes good” story. We have two tonight.
DAVID GADDIS SMITH writes:
Pretty neat to see former U-T colleague David Poller's byline leading off the New York Times Evening Briefing!
LISA PETRILLO writes:
Jack - Like mansplaining, it's time for Del-splaining:
For whoever doesn’t get why the “Delaware man to address 1st joint session of Congress” headline was so brilliant, then you should just stick to vanilla ice cream the rest of your life. Let the rest of us savor our flavors.
“Delaware Man” is apex history to those of us born and raised in the first state to sign the U.S. Constitution. Delaware has suffered as the long-running butt of Hollywood jokes like in “The West Wing,” but with our man Joe Biden we’re claiming our due.
Our Delaware is so small the state song is short because we have only three counties. We can’t even claim the pride of being the most something, because Rhode Island claims smallest stateliness.
We’re a state with constant growth yet STILL have less than 1 million population.
Though our Dupont scientists invented nylon, Tang, Velcro and Teflon (unfortunately) we STILL have more chickens than people.
We proudly hosted the Underground Railroad, yet our most famous conductor Thomas Garrett, a Quaker featured in the film “Harriett,” had his house burned down. Though we’re just north of the Mason-Dixon line, we fought divided in the Civil War.
We’re so desperate for respect we keep changing our state motto, wearing out over a dozen:
· The Peach State (until disease wiped them out)
· The First State
· The Diamond State (small but precious)
· Uncle Sam’s Pocket Handkerchief
· The Corporate Capital (1.5 million already incorporated in a state only 90 miles long)
· Home of Tax-Free Shopping, winner of the most uninspiring
We produced George Thorogood and the Delaware Destroyers https://youtu.be/IyhJ69mD7xI, hosted F. Scott Fitzgerald, Edgar Allen Poe (who put a curse on the deliciously seedy Deer Park bar), Kevin Bacon, Reese Witherspoon’s first husband, Bob Marley and Cab Calloway, and claim natives Valerie Bertinelli and Aubrey Plaza.
Our state university that educated both me and Joe, University of Delaware, is one of America’s oldest. I studied English/Journalism in classrooms dating to 1743.
So damn straight, I’m here to tell you that “Delaware Man hosts 1st Joint Session of Congress” deserves big wood back home.
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JIM O’CONNELL writes:
OK, no one appointed me chief of the morality police, and my favorite weird headline, "Boy Enters Sheep at Fair" implies an act the animal might not enjoy, but I must object to "Nut Bolts...".
To refer to the rape of a woman, a violent violation of a real human being, as a "screw" is not funny. What if it were rape of a child, is that amusing too? Would you say a victim of lynching "swings" if it made a pun? As journalists we should know language matters, and using language that dehumanizes victims, is wrong even when -- especially when -- we are talking among ourselves.
CHRIS COOK writes:
Speaking of double-entendre headlines, during my brief tenure as an editor on the Detroit Free Press national + foreign desk, i had one rejected, too. The story was a shortie in the briefs roundup column.
Somewhere in the northwest, at a live-fire range on a US Army base, an infantry company was test-firing new 30-caliber guns mounted on their personnel carriers. The range happened to be next to a farmer’s field where a herd of cows had been grazing. The noise spooked the cows, which broke through the fence. Terrified cows came charging onto the firing range and several were killed.
My headline was “Apocalypse Cow.”
The news editor killed it on the basis that the story wasn’t funny. He was probably right. But, dang, I liked that headline.
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DAVID FARMER writes:
I learned a useful thing in my high school biology class, and it was this: thing. Let me explain.
The biology instructor was William Hannigan. He'd been teaching at Ramona High School for decades.
Sometimes Mr. Hannigan would lose his train of thought. He would pause to search his memory. If he didn't find the right words immediately, he would mentally shrug and say, "Thing." That meant he was abandoning the thought. He would then launch into another topic.
I said above that this technique was useful. In the decades since high school I have occasionally employed it as a way to put an end to a discussion that was going nowhere. This works well with my brother Mike, who also had biology with Mr. Hannigan.
But the circumstance where I could really use it is in arguments with my wife. And on those occasions the "thing" dodge can be positively perilous. Hinda knows that when I say "thing" I'm trying to cut the argument short the cowardly way.
She hardly ever lets me get away with it. I've found that she likes arguments. So then what I do is...thing.
REBER: I think “thing” could save marriages. George Burns wrote that he and Gracie had a similar deal. When one of them wanted to abandon a topic they would say “Pass the salt,” and the other person would change the subject.
George wrote that he learned this technique from his mother. In his younger days she was telling him of the high moral standards in his family.
“And she said, ‘All of your seven sisters were married virgins.’
“I said, ‘Mama, the reason they were married virgins is because they weren't very pretty.’
“And my mother said, ‘Pass the salt.’"
I wish I knew more about George’s mother. She sounds like a pip.
Burns wrote about an early girl friend. “I was 14 years old. She was 16. And she wore lipstick. In those days, if you wore lipstick you were a prostitute. She not only had on lipstick, she had a beauty mark, too. Made it even worse.
“So I brought her home and I said to my mother, I want you to meet my sweetheart, Gertha DeFore. My mother said to Gertha, are you Jewish, Gertha? And Gertha said, no. She says do you understand Jewish? And Gertha said, no. She says, do you understand George? And Gertha says, no. And in Jewish, my mother turned around to me and she said, go to hell. And she turned around to Gertha, and she said, I just told my son what a charming girl you are.”
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LEE GRANT writes:
David Farmer may think Gary Oldham was one of the world’s greatest actors. He may be but even greater is Gary Oldman.
And speaking of trains, did anyone mention “Throw Momma From the Train” directed by Danny DeVito and starring Billy Crystal?
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REBER: Tonight we wish Thomas Neumann a Happy Birthday on May 1.
P.O. Box 2239
Ramona, CA 92065-0938
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