I’m not quite done with “Poorly Made in China” by Paul Midler, but it has already changed my life, specifically what type of mushrooms I buy. Paul is kind of the “cultural grease” that smooths business relations between factories in China and international importers.
One of the projects he works on is a bottled soap that depending on its packaging is hand soap, body wash, or bubble bath (the contents are all the same). Anyhow, after Paul sees the lack of standards and corner cutting that goes on at the factory that makes the soap, he stops using soap when he showers.
Today while shopping for groceries, Annie sent me off to get canned mushrooms. Unfortunately, all the canned mushrooms were Made in China, begging me…
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The way I see it there are 3 ways that technology rapidly advances:
1) Greed - Somebody is going to make oodles of money if…
2) Space - “How the heck are we gonna win this here space race?”
3) War - “How do we kill more of them and save more of us?”
Let’s think about this in terms of our quest for alternative fuels.
Since we’re not launching poop-powered rockets into space…yet. And the green revolution has yet to fully evolve. War might be our best hope. (That’s a sentence I never thought I’d ever write.)
Consider this piece in the Washington Post:
“Every time you bring a gallon of fuel forward, you have to send a convoy,” said Alan R. Shaffer, director of defense research and engineering at the Pentagon. “That…
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David Sedaris is at it again in the New Yorker. And here I figured that it would probably be awhile before he wrote for them again due to the intrusive nature of their fact-checkers.
When you’re young, it’s easy to believe that such an opportunity will come again, maybe even a better one. Instead of a Lebanese guy in Italy, it might be a Nigerian one in Belgium, or maybe a Pole in Turkey. You tell yourself that if you travelled alone to Europe this summer you could surely do the same thing next year and the year after that. Of course, you don’t, though, and the next thing you know you’re an aging, unemployed elf, so desperate for love that you spend your evening mooning over…
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I just stumbled upon a review of WAIW in the Key West Citizen.
Do you know where your clothes were made, by whom and under what conditions? Do you care? Should you care?
There’s at least one journalist and travel writer out there who thinks you should.
In his non-fiction debut “Where Am I Wearing,” former Keys resident and Ohio native Kelsey Timmerman contemplates the tag in the back of his favorite T-shirt (it reads “Made in Honduras”) and decides to visit the places where his clothes were made in the hope that he might meet just a few of the people who had produced them.
Key West is where I got my start as a writer. It’s less romantic than it sounds. I didn’t write with a mojito at…
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The latest ire of the anti-sweatshop movement is Russell Athletics. Activists have convinced major universities to cancel apparel contracts with the company.
From Forbes.com:
According to the Workers Rights Consortium, a group that monitors labor conditions abroad for colleges, Russell spent two years trying to intimidate workers who attempted to unionize before closing the factory when they did.
“They’re well on their way to being the first company in history to be kicked out of collegiate sports because of their labor practices,” said Scott Nova, the executive director of the WRC. “I can’t imagine their affiliates will be too happy about that, which includes the NBA and the NFL and others.”
Russell says it announced the closure of the factory last October due to falling demand for the fleece sewn there….
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(I was going to post on some recent headlines that hit me kind of hard. When I started to write about them, I realized I was just rewriting something I had written already. This is that something. I wrote it 5 years ago, but it’s still how I feel.)
Visiting a friend who is a fine wine and cheese kind of guy, he asks me, “What’s your favorite cheese to eat with red wine?”
I turn the question over in my head searching for the perfect cheese or at least one that sounds like it: American, Swiss, French (is there French cheese or only dressing?), Colby, cheddar, smoked cheddar with bacon, Velveeta. “I don’t know? I’m just a simple small town kinda of fella. I actually…
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Yesterday I was asked about the theoretical structure of “Where Am I Wearing?” I gave an answer that involved my underwear. I don’t think that plays well in Academia. What I wanted to say was this…
“WAIW isn’t an academic work…people actually enjoy reading it!”
And in bigger news…
Harper laughed!
I’m out of town for one night and I miss her first laugh. Annie gave me the news last night. I’m not sure what time she laughed, but I wonder if at that exact moment her father was being asked about the theoretical structure of his book….
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I’m at IU tomorrow morning and afternoon and then it’s off to Chicago to meet with Rule29.
From Indiana University’s Communication & Culture Graduate program’s blog…
…
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Last week I saw David Sedaris speak at Ball State University here in Muncie.
Nothing is off limits for his wit. Israeli-Palestinian conflict – cracked me up. His family’s love for off-beat taxidermy – killed. At one point he was talking about the preserved severed head of a South American girl from the 15th century and I’m sure I wasn’t alone in my struggle to keep from laughing aloud.
One of the stories he read was about his decision to put out a tip jar during a book tour. He did it to be funny, but soon he was pulling down $200 - $400 per night and, regardless of how great the crowd was, he started to judge them on the amount they tipped him. I…
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…you are a local cake judge. That’s what I am today at Kennedy Library in Muncie.
I’m one of the judges in the libraries annual Edible Books Festival:
Entirely edible creations should feature books, a literary theme, stories, authors and/or characters. That’s right, all entries must be created of edible materials. Cakes, pies, vegetables, nuts, bread, popcorn, juices, candy and other food stuffs are great. Just make sure it doesn’t melt or get yucky before the Festival is over at 4 p.m.
This should be fun. Unfortunately, because of health code stuff, there will be no eating of the cakes. So I’ll be judging books that can’t be read and cakes that can’t be eaten.
Last night Annie made an Edible Book based on Where Am I Wearing?. (I…
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