A report from the field: (Well, from the yard anyway): Over this hot, dry summer, the mighty but lowly dandelions proved themselves the ultimate survivalists. Let’s weed through the headlines.
“Leave the selfie sticks at home, say Evergreen State Fair officials”: Unless, of course, they are employed as the base to be covered in cotton candy.
“It looks like there will never be an Amazon Fire Phone 2”: It would seem the company’s practice wherein colleagues rip each other’s ideas apart in order to torpedo bad plans and arrive at the best possible concept, did not work in this case.
“Law professors give opinions on Tom Brady’s appeal”: “Well, there’s no denying he’s just darn handsome,” said one. “And an OK quarterback, to boot,” said another.
“Looking to future, more NCAA athletes seek own trademarks”: Go ahead, call me grandma, but I miss the days when people didn’t think of themselves as a “brand” to be marketed.
“Police confront North Dakota students armed with telescope”: That’ll teach those wannabe astronomy gangsters.
“Benedictine monk relaxing atop wind turbine spotted by drone”: As the nuns used to say, “Jesus, Mary and Joseph!” (Let’s make St. Jude Thaddeus, the patron saint of lost causes, the patron saint of drones.)
“Whiskey in space! Why is a Japanese company sending booze to the International Space Station?”: To help the astronauts forget about other needed supplies that haven’t arrived?
“Usain Bolt wins 200-meter dash, gets knocked over by Segway”: As they say, you can’t make this stuff up. At the point of the accidental vehicle assault, the fastest man in the world was walking, not running, so why a photographer felt he needed to ride a Segway to film Bolt is not understood. But photographers who are not lazy have every right to curse this guy for giving them a bad name.
“Here are the most popular vehicles by state”: Washington’s most popular vehicle is the Nissan Leaf. No surprise. (Although big trucks seem a close second.) If you don’t own a Leaf, you can check if your car is the most popular elsewhere. For example, my car, a model that Kia doesn’t even bother to advertise, made the list. The Kia Rio is the most popular car in … Kentucky. It must be all that horsepower.
“New Jersey teacher who was late for work 111 times keeps job”: That’s because he was able to finagle his case into a series of math problems. For example: teacher Arnold Anderson, who earns $90,000 a year, was late 46 times in the most recent school year through March 20 and 65 times in the previous school year, but was able to keep his job. What is the formula for calculating the total cost to our collective credulity?
(One bright spot: The arbitrator’s response to Anderson’s claim that the quality of his teaching outweighed his tardiness: The teacher relied on “micro-quibbles of a few unpersuasive explanations, with a macro-default position that even when he is late he nevertheless delivers a superb educational experience to his grateful students,” the arbitrator wrote.)
Be sure to serve some lovely micro-quibbles at your next brunch.
Carol MacPherson: 425-339-3472; cmacpherson@heraldnet.com.
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