From: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org (fegmaniax-digest) To: fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Subject: fegmaniax-digest V13 #161 Reply-To: fegmaniax@smoe.org Sender: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk fegmaniax-digest Thursday, June 3 2004 Volume 13 : Number 161 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak [Ken Weingold ] Re: fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 [Michael R Godwin ] Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak [Jeff Dwarf ] Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak ["Fortissimo" ] Re: fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 [Sebastian Hagedorn ] Re: fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 [Michael R Godwin ] Re: fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 ["Stewart C. Russell" ] Re: the legendary fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 [Ken Weingold ] Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak ["Rex Broome" ] Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak ["Rex Broome" ] re: MG and RB [Eb ] plurality ["Fortissimo" ] re: MG and RB ["Fortissimo" ] reap-ish [Eb ] Jeme has pretty much nailed it, as have others [Jill Brand ] Re: reap-ish [Sebastian Hagedorn ] Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak [Aaron Mandel ] RE: The Paw-Paw Cardboard Digipak ["Palle Hoffstein" ] RE: The Paw-Paw Cardboard Digipak ["Rex Broome" ] Re: Jeme has pretty much nailed it, as have others ["Fortissimo" Subject: Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak Some really cool packaging was the Rolling Stones reissues that were like little records, artwork, record sleeves, inserts, and all, but slipped into plastic cases. Only problem was that those cases don't fit in standard CD racks. Too tall. - -Ken ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 18:02:06 +0100 (BST) From: Michael R Godwin Subject: Re: fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 > Date: Wed, 02 Jun 2004 15:08:05 -0500 > From: "Fortissimo" > Subject: alleged humpty-dumptyist tendencies > Or one I've just recently become aware of, "legend." The common usage of > the word to mean "notable or preeminent instance of" - as in the > forthcoming philatelic series "Legends of Pedantry," depicting notable > pedants through the ages - is recent enough that in the dictionary > closest to hand here at my lame-ass job (Webster's New Collegiate > Dictionary, 1981 ed.), that definition is not even listed. One comes > close - "a person or thing that inspires legends." But the transition > from the Latin gerund meaning approx. "gathering," to specifically a > story gathered from the past, to the sense that emphasizes the mythic > quality of such stories ("people say that, but it's just a legend"), to > "person that inspires legends," is a fairly major semantic shift or > expansion. Presumably, those shifts were motivated by shifts in the way > people used the word. (And how the meaning evolved that denotes a caption > or the list of symbols on a map, I don't know...) There was a phase when every [male] act was introduced with the words "And here he is, a legend in his own lifetime". I assume that this usage dates from that era. All you Chicago fegs, when did the Legendary Stardust Cowboy start making records? - - Mike Godwin PS I infer from my copy of Excel that in American English, "legend" means "key". None of my students ever has the faintest idea what it means (not that I've asked them). PPS Bizarre plurals dept: I heard on the TV the other day: "The couple HAS issued a writ". Pedantry gone barmy or what? ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 10:02:23 -0700 (PDT) From: Jeff Dwarf Subject: Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak Ken Weingold wrote: > Some really cool packaging was the Rolling Stones > reissues that were like little records, artwork, record > sleeves, inserts, and all, but slipped into plastic > cases. Only problem was that those cases don't > fit in standard CD racks. Too tall. Same with the initial (non-American) XTC reissues. I ended up sticking the discs themselves in those halfwidth jewels, and just having the artwork in the general area of the cds in question. ===== "Life is just a series of dogs." -- George Carlin "I'm going to keep playing music until somebody shoots me." -- Scott McCaughey "It would not now surprise me in the least if, one night on TV, right there during The Memo, [Bill] O'Reilly declared himself to be the Grand Duchess Anastasia." -- Charles Pierce on MSNBC.com __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger. http://messenger.yahoo.com/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 12:11:03 -0500 From: "Fortissimo" Subject: Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak On Thu, 03 Jun 2004 09:39:53 -0700, "Rex Broome" said: > Anyway, back to the cardboard thing... the Television reissues of last > year, although very nice and apparently way more respectfully produced > than these, did that cardboard format as well, and, guys... they just > don't hold up. My copy of Adventure arrived via mail order with an > already partially-collapsed spine... major drag. And another thing... > look, yeah, jewel cases are bland and kinda indifferent, but *at least > they keep the actual surfaces of the artwork from rubbing up against each > other when filed*. The kind of scuffing the doesn't much matter on big > old 12" by 12" images totally screws up images which are 1/4 the size. Definitely count me in the pro-jewelbox camp. Not only that, if the jewelbox itself gets scuffed, or broken, etc., they're easily and cheaply replaced - and voila, your CD looks like new again. I like what some of the small letterpress cardboard boxes look like...but they're not as durable, and when they're odd-sized, it makes storage a pain. When they're *really* odd-sized, and don't even fit in my shelving units (and therefore end up with the box sets), it actually means I listen to them less. For some reason, I don't think of pulling items from that shelf as often as I do from the main collection. Then there are those maniacal types who toss the jewelbox completely, and store all the packaging and the CD in plastic slipcases bound into binders, to save space. I suppose if you're even more of a fanatic collector than I am, and you have 10,000 or 20,000 CDs, this might be all but inevitable...but it just seems excessive to me. - ------------------------------- ...Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: "In two thousand years, they'll still be looking for Elvis - :: this is nothing new," said the priest. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 19:23:31 +0200 From: Sebastian Hagedorn Subject: Re: fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 - -- Michael R Godwin is rumored to have mumbled on Donnerstag, 3. Juni 2004 18:02 Uhr +0100 regarding Re: fegmaniax-digest V13 #160: > PPS Bizarre plurals dept: I heard on the TV the other day: "The couple HAS > issued a writ". Pedantry gone barmy or what? I thought you could use that either way in English? In German you *have* to use the singular, because grammatically, if not semantically, it *is* a single subject. The same goes for collective nouns like "the police". I remember how freaked out I used to be by sentences like "the police have arrested a suspect" ... - -- Sebastian Hagedorn Ehrenfeldg|rtel 156, 50823 Kvln, Germany http://www.spinfo.uni-koeln.de/~hgd/ "Being just contaminates the void" - Robyn Hitchcock ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 10:34:03 -0700 From: Tom Clark Subject: Re: the legendary fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 On Jun 3, 2004, at 10:02 AM, Michael R Godwin wrote: > PS I infer from my copy of Excel that in American English, "legend" > means > "key". None of my students ever has the faintest idea what it means > (not > that I've asked them). > That term is mostly used with maps. - -tc np - New Mission of Burma. Definitely gonna go on my top ten for '04. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 18:36:41 +0100 (BST) From: Michael R Godwin Subject: Re: fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 > -- Michael R Godwin is rumored to have mumbled on > Donnerstag, 3. Juni 2004 18:02 Uhr +0100 regarding Re: fegmaniax-digest V13 > #160: > > PPS Bizarre plurals dept: I heard on the TV the other day: "The couple HAS > > issued a writ". Pedantry gone barmy or what? On Thu, 3 Jun 2004, Sebastian Hagedorn wrote: > I thought you could use that either way in English? In German you *have* to > use the singular, because grammatically, if not semantically, it *is* a > single subject. The same goes for collective nouns like "the police". I > remember how freaked out I used to be by sentences like "the police have > arrested a suspect" ... It may be "correct" but I've never heard it before, and I've seen a million wedding reports in the local paper which all say "The happy couple ARE spending their honeymoon in the south of France". "The happy couple is spending its honeymoon ..." looks ridiculous to me. And as for this craze of treating group names as singular! I can just about see why you might write "The Who has announced a new song on its album which is available at Tescos" - but doesn't that mean you would also have to write "The Faces has announced..." which is obviously wrong. - - Mike "Mumbling" Godwin "The police arrest a man every 3 minutes - and believe me, he's getting fed up with it". ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 13:40:40 -0400 From: "Stewart C. Russell" Subject: Re: fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 Michael wrote: > > PS I infer from my copy of Excel that in American English, "legend" means > "key". It's pretty standard UK usage, too: Stewart ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 13:52:35 -0400 From: Ken Weingold Subject: Re: the legendary fegmaniax-digest V13 #160 On Thu, Jun 3, 2004, Tom Clark wrote: > > np - New Mission of Burma. Definitely gonna go on my top ten for '04. Yeah, I've really been enjoying it. - -Ken ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 11:12:31 -0700 From: "Rex Broome" Subject: Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak Jeff D: >Same with the initial (non-American) XTC reissues. I ended >up sticking the discs themselves in those halfwidth jewels, >and just having the artwork in the general area of the cds >in question. I had to do the same with some compilation of original songs by members of one of my geeky internet mailing lists. The jackass who compiled it made this booklet that was like half an inch taller than the disc. Bizarre. - -Rex Need a new email address that people can remember Check out the new EudoraMail at http://www.eudoramail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 11:21:28 -0700 From: "Rex Broome" Subject: Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak Jeffrey: >I like what some of the small letterpress cardboard boxes look like...but >they're not as durable, and when they're odd-sized, it makes storage a >pain. When they're *really* odd-sized, and don't even fit in my shelving >units (and therefore end up with the box sets), it actually means I >listen to them less. For some reason, I don't think of pulling items from >that shelf as often as I do from the main collection. I actually have taken to making jewel case inlays for the individual discs in my box sets, just so I don't forget their existence because they're outside my "normal" collection. (Mind you, I'm only talking about the "book format" ones which don't already have jewel-cases inside the books). It's not as obsessive or time consuming as it sounds. Just open a template, type a new name on the spine, maybe drop copied track info from the AMG on the back if you feel like it, print it and stick it in a case. That way you don't totally forget that you actually have some Phil Ochs or some groovy live covers by Echo and the Bunnymen all the time. >Then there are those maniacal types who toss the jewelbox completely, and >store all the packaging and the CD in plastic slipcases bound into >binders, to save space. I suppose if you're even more of a fanatic >collector than I am, and you have 10,000 or 20,000 CDs, this might be all >but inevitable...but it just seems excessive to me. Agreed. Plus I like my enormous wall o' spines. I sincerely doubt my collection will ever break 3000 titles anyhow... - -Rex Need a new email address that people can remember Check out the new EudoraMail at http://www.eudoramail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 12:35:28 -0700 From: Eb Subject: re: MG and RB > PPS Bizarre plurals dept: I heard on the TV the other day: "The couple > HAS > issued a writ". Pedantry gone barmy or what? That's totally correct, and it doesn't even sound unnatural to me. > And as for this craze of treating group names as singular! I can just > about see why you might write "The Who has announced a new song on its > album which is available at Tescos" - but doesn't that mean you would > also > have to write "The Faces has announced..." which is obviously wrong. The obvious difference is that "Faces" ends in -s and "Who" doesn't. Makes perfect sense to me. I've wrestled with this problem numerous times, though -- it does have some gray area. Like, it sounds fine to say "The Who begins its tour on August 22nd," but it sounds terrible to say "The Who destroyed its instruments during the encore." Maybe it comes down to the predicate noun being singular rather than plural. I usually just work around the problem by choosing to phrase the latter thought in a different way. What bugs *me* a bit is how you can't remove "The" from singular band names. Like, if Faces albums are listed under "Faces," it looks fine. But if you see a column with the names "Who," "Fall," "Band," "Police," "Clean," etc. it looks really screwy. :) > I actually have taken to making jewel case inlays for the individual > discs in my box sets, just so I don't forget their existence because > they're outside my "normal" collection. I do that too, though in a fairly spartan manner. For my box sets which don't house the discs in individual jewelboxes (I believe this boils down to two Nuggets boxes, the Burt Bacharach box and the Charles Mingus box), I transferred the discs to spare jewelboxes and added back inserts with self-typed track listings. Eb ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 14:55:10 -0500 From: "Fortissimo" Subject: plurality On Thu, 3 Jun 2004 18:36:41 +0100 (BST), "Michael R Godwin" said: > And as for this craze of treating group names as singular! I can just > about see why you might write "The Who has announced a new song on its > album which is available at Tescos" - but doesn't that mean you would > also > have to write "The Faces has announced..." which is obviously wrong. Standard American usage has always treated singular group nouns (The Who, Mercury Rev, Mott the Hoople) with singular verbs. It's also typical that when a collective entity is acting as an entity (rather than as its components), a singular verb is used. Thus, "the couple has announced its intentions to wed" rather than "the couple have announced their intention to wed." What's curious is that you refer to the "craze of treating group names as singular" - which implies to me that apparently, Brits are following the American practice. And what's funny about *that* is that here, you could spot Anglophile pop fans by their habit of saying things that to most Americans sound wrong, like "The Who have released yet another compilation reshuffling the same twenty tracks in still different configuration." On the flipside, if standard American usage treats group nouns as a collective entity & thereby takes the singular form (i.e., "The Who has..." would be typical here), it's only a further step to reason that, well, if the group is acting as an entity and not as individual members, even if its name is plural, it should be regarded as a singular entity - resulting in constructions like "Talking Heads is talking about reuniting, but only if Chris Franz loses enough weight to not require his own tour bus." - ------------------------------- ...Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: Solipsism is its own reward :: :: --Crow T. Robot ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 15:07:57 -0500 From: "Fortissimo" Subject: re: MG and RB On Thu, 3 Jun 2004 12:35:28 -0700, "Eb" said: > What bugs *me* a bit is how you can't remove "The" from singular band > names. Like, if Faces albums are listed under "Faces," it looks fine. > But if you see a column with the names "Who," "Fall," "Band," "Police," > "Clean," etc. it looks really screwy. :) That's one thing I hated about AMG until recently (they've corrected it): they'd leave articles off band names. Someone will surely think of an actual example - but this is a real problem when there are two groups with the "same" name, except one uses an article and the other doesn't. The fictitious example, I think, was in one of the outtakes on the Spinal Tap DVD: a discussion of two bands, Fuck and The Fuck, one of whom was from LA and the other of which was British... (No relation to the *actual* band called Fuck. Man, I'm fucking with people's shit-filters today.) - ------------------------------- ...Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: "In two thousand years, they'll still be looking for Elvis - :: this is nothing new," said the priest. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 13:16:36 -0700 From: Eb Subject: reap-ish Stereolab: dropped from Elektra. :( They sold "only" 40,000 copies of their last album. Jeez, how many albums is a group like Stereolab *supposed* to sell? Eb ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 16:26:35 -0400 (EDT) From: Jill Brand Subject: Jeme has pretty much nailed it, as have others Jeme wrote (and I'm compressing this a bit): "Pardon me, Jill, if this isn't true, but I get the impression that Jill really does live for these games and puts all kinds of effort into shuttling her daughter to the games and making a point of going to every one...." No need for pardoning, Jeme; this is all absolutely true. What I don't get is why some people seem to think this is such a bad thing (I *don't* mean Jeme and Natalie; this is is a pervasive sentiment in the "hope I die before I get old" crowd). My parents were somewhat interested in what I did, sort of, and were also very politically involved (I'm a pink diaper baby; they were curious but not party members), but my dad's causes and culture vulturing often seemed more important than my games (I played softball) or school plays and concerts (it was let known that parental duty was driving them to attend). By the time I was my son's age (15), I never told my parents anything at all. I love my children dearly and don't want them to grow away from me. I can't remember who wrote this: > To generalize, a poor, African-American mother who rides a bus with her > son to his soccer game has *never* been what the phrase referred to: > there's always been a class component to it, and more to the point, a > lifestyle component. I bet she'd be happy to be called a soccer mom. Since my kids travel to play, I've met moms richer and poorer than me from all different ethnic groups, and they all seem to be into their children. Jeme wrote: "I think it's pretty safe to say that Jill is firmly in the class and I have always gotten the impression that she's got the lifestyle, too. The problem here wasn't so much calling Jill a soccer mom, but saying that if a soccer mom is into it, it is de facto uncool." Exactly true (but no SUV and a small house on a 7200 sq. ft. lot; we're lowly educator and scientist types). It is the latter that is so annoying (soccer moms can't be into anything cool), and I think it's an age issue, a mentality sometimes held by people who still are only responsible for themselves. You give up a lot when you are a soccer mom, but you can gain a lot, too. I like to think that my involvement has led my kids to be as uncool as they are in the eyes of many of their classmates (Melanie hates Britney, make-up and belly-button shirts; Curt thinks MTV is total crap, belongs to the gay/straight alliance, and has marched against the war in Iraq...OK, for some reason he likes some Elton John music, but other than that, he's almost perfect). So with all this blithering, what I'm really trying to say is that you'd be surprised to see how many people you have something in common with when you look beyond the labels. But yeah, I'd probably roll my eyes at someone jumping up and down to The End of the World as well. But you see, you wouldn't have caught me dead at an REM gig after about 1987 anyway because I wouldn't have wanted to be surrounded by a lot of "I want Michael Stipe for my prom date; is my hair as big as Robert Smith's?" teeny boppers anyway. That was meant to be funny, by the way. Jill ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 13:42:21 -0700 From: Eb Subject: Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak Oh, and regarding oversized cardboard sleeves which don't fit right into a CD collection, I have exactly two: the Butter 08 CD and Fluid Ounces' In the New Old-Fashioned Way. The titles easily come to mind. They're especially annoying for me, because I store lots of CDs in those industry-mailing 25-count boxes, which have no room at all for extra width. Eb ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 22:55:07 +0200 From: Sebastian Hagedorn Subject: Re: reap-ish - -- Eb is rumored to have mumbled on Donnerstag, 3. Juni 2004 13:16 Uhr -0700 regarding reap-ish: > Stereolab: dropped from Elektra. :( Is that necessarily a bad thing? Maybe they're better off with a smaller label ... > They sold "only" 40,000 copies of their last album. Jeez, how many albums > is a group like Stereolab *supposed* to sell? Right, 40,000 seems a decent number. - -- Sebastian Hagedorn Ehrenfeldg|rtel 156, 50823 Kvln, Germany http://www.spinfo.uni-koeln.de/~hgd/ "Being just contaminates the void" - Robyn Hitchcock ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 17:02:38 -0400 (EDT) From: Aaron Mandel Subject: Re: The Paw-Paw Carboard Digipak On Thu, 3 Jun 2004, Eb wrote: > They're especially annoying for me, because I store lots of CDs in > those industry-mailing 25-count boxes, which have no room at all for > extra width. I spent several years storing my discs in 10-pound jelly bean boxes from my family's candy store, after discovering that they fit precisely 25 CDs. I now wonder if, in reality, that's what that box-size was developed for, and the candy industry just went along for the ride. There's certainly more space leftover if you put 10 pounds of jellybeans in one than if you use it for CDs. a ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 14:07:04 -0700 From: "Palle Hoffstein" Subject: RE: The Paw-Paw Cardboard Digipak I only have one over-sized cardboard cd package - a Lemon Jelly CD, one of the few real electronica albums I own. The packaging and art is actually quite cool, but the wrong size bothers me. There are all my CDs, filed carefully on the shelves, over two thousand of the bloody things, and one stupid CD is bigger than the others. Maybe I wouldn't mind if it was the best CD I own, but it's not. I like the look and feel of the cardboard CD packages. Maybe they do remind me of vinyl packaging - I suspect that's it. But even though I prefer the sound of vinyl over CDs I switched to CDs early on because I love permanence. I was willing to sacrifice the better sound of new vinyl for the ever-durable sound of CD. Therefore, I want my CD packages to last forever too. But the cardboard packages do not age well, so I default to jewel cases when there's an option. I still have some CDs that I bought in the eighties. Man the booklets sucked back then. There's nothing inside but that AAD, ADD, DDD stuff! What were they thinking? Palle NP: Scott 3 - Scott Walker ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 14:45:34 -0700 From: "Palle Hoffstein" Subject: RE: reap-ish > They sold "only" 40,000 copies of their last album. Jeez, how many albums > is a group like Stereolab *supposed* to sell? >Right, 40,000 seems a decent number. Warner/Elektra/Atlantic are seriously downsizing. This may have run here already: http://www.eurweb.com/articles/headlines/05202004/headlines1461905202004.cfm With Warner/Elektra/Atlantic dropping over a third of their whole rosters, I gotta think a lot of their more alternative artists aren't safe. With recent albums by RH, Sterolab and the Flaming Lips being on Warner, Warner has been about the only of the "big" record companies that I've been purchasing anything from. If Stereolab isn't safe I wonder if the Lips are. Palle *** NP: Iron and Wine - Our Endless Numbered Days ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 15:29:23 -0700 From: "Rex Broome" Subject: RE: The Paw-Paw Cardboard Digipak Palle >I still have some CDs that I bought in the eighties. Man the booklets sucked >back then. There's nothing inside but that AAD, ADD, DDD stuff! What were >they thinking? At the time? They were thinking "this is so much better than cassette packaging", and we were agreeing! Slightly larger reproductions of the LP cover art, and in the right aspect ration (sorry, filmspeak, but couldn't think of a better way to say "they were square)... and I remember actually thinking that the Warners policy of having *one page's worth* of "historical notes" was awesome compared to what I was used to. I actually used them as reference. No AMG back then, you know, and they only updated the Harmony Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock so often. - -Rex, who still has his second edition HIEOR... it has OMD in it, but not REM... does that qualify as "cool"? Need a new email address that people can remember Check out the new EudoraMail at http://www.eudoramail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 17:30:55 -0500 From: "Fortissimo" Subject: Re: reap-ish On Thu, 3 Jun 2004 13:16:36 -0700, "Eb" said: > Stereolab: dropped from Elektra. :( > > They sold "only" 40,000 copies of their last album. Jeez, how many > albums is a group like Stereolab *supposed* to sell? This is sad to me because it implies the end of a long history with Elektra Records of managing to maintain a boutique-label-y ambience even though they've been part of a major for quite some time. I know we have some Bjork-haters here - but even if you don't like her stuff, it certainly isn't Britney...and it certainly doesn't sound like something that was ever going to sell ten trazillion copies. If you look over the roster of Elektra over the years, there are a number of fine, influential acts that never sold, and were unlikely ever to sell, copies in the terms now expected of major labels. I'm sure any number of indie labels are salivating over picking up Stereolab's work, though. Last I heard, indie labels were still doing relatively well, in comparison to past years (not incidentally poking a big stick in the eye of the RIAA's args re downloading & "piracy"): does anyone know if that's still the case? - ------------------------------- ...Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: crumple zones:: :: harmful or fatal if swallowed :: :: small-craft warning :: ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 03 Jun 2004 17:42:24 -0500 From: "Fortissimo" Subject: Re: Jeme has pretty much nailed it, as have others On Thu, 3 Jun 2004 16:26:35 -0400 (EDT), "Jill Brand" said: > Jeme wrote (and I'm compressing this a bit): > > "Pardon me, Jill, if this isn't true, but I get the impression that Jill > really does live for these games and puts all kinds of effort into > shuttling her daughter to the games and making a point of going to every > one...." > > No need for pardoning, Jeme; this is all absolutely true. What I don't > get is why some people seem to think this is such a bad thing I don't know who thinks it's a bad thing in itself. The problem seems to arise from parents who suddenly both seem to care about nothing else at all (although that may simply be a time-factor thing) and who also metamorphose into suburban drones, if not literally suburbanizing then in terms of appearance, politics, and general social attitudes. It's as if they'd been told that certain things go with being "parents," and figure that they now must *be* those things. Obviously, I'm talking about a general attitude, and not anything I'm assuming about you, whom I don't know. I could be wrong - but didn't the phrase "soccer mom" originate as, essentially, code for "white middle-class female voters" and their presumed interests? Some journalist somewhere was casting about for a lifestyle option to stand as synecdoche for this package of interests and outlooks, and latched onto the popularity of soccer among middle-class white kids...and voila, a phrase was born. Thing is, if I understand you, Jill, you've been arguing all along that it's perfectly possible to be a dedicated parent, including shuttling kids hither & yon to soccer matches, etc., and *not* drone out as in the paragraph above. I certainly agree: all three of my siblings, and all my friends who are parents, are pretty much in the same situation you describe yourself as being in. They *haven't* stopped being interested in the world: on the contrary, raising children makes their interest in the world sharper and more personal - because the world being so shaped is the world their own kids will grow up in. To sum up: I at least think the following might be a "bad thing": if parents focus only *narrowly* on their child's interests, and don't recognize that *their* interests (the ones they had before they were parents) are apt to provide a more interesting and stimulating environment *for* their kids, and that it's a lot more likely that kids who grow up in boring, conformist households live boring, conformist lives, compared to kids who are exposed to a broader range of possibilities. (Exceptions, generalizations, etc.: the usual provisos) - ------------------------------- ...Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: "In two thousand years, they'll still be looking for Elvis - :: this is nothing new," said the priest. ------------------------------ End of fegmaniax-digest V13 #161 ********************************