Overlap

Heard the same thing said about two very different people today. One came from a professor talking about Plato and the other was an interview with a writer for the Cobert Report.

"It can be difficult to know sometimes where the person ends and where the character begins. It's difficult to know if (Plato or Stephen Colbert) is really thinking the same thing as (Plato speaking as Socrates or the character Stephen Colbert plays). Sometimes there is overlap and it's not always clear.

Oprah

I was listening to a local radio show about books when this came up:

Person A: What do you think of Wally Lamb's new book?
Person B: It's amazing. He's one of our best local authors in Connecticut.
Person A: The book is set during the time of Columbine and seems so authentic.
Person B: Here's a story about Wally Lamb that a lot of people don't know. When his first book started to get a lot of attention he got a call at school from Oprah. He picked up the phone and said, "Oprah, I can't talk to you. There's been a calamity." And he hung up on her. What had happened was a driver reaching for his beer* ran over two students and killed them. And Wally Lamb, as the school's director, felt he needed to be there for the family and help take care of the situation. Just a noble, noble man.
Person A: Yes, a noble man.

Dude, come on. That's not noble. That would be the decent thing to do.

I've really got to stop listening to local talk radio.

*In Connecticut it's completely legal to have an open can of liquor in your car.

In a book and on the radio

I heard two food related things today that I thought were interesting:

1) A friend suggested the book In Defense of Food. I read a passage today that really stuck with me:

"Nutrition science has usually put more of its energies into the idea that the problems it studies are the result of too much of a bad thing instead of too little of a good thing...The epidemiologist John Powles has suggested this predilection is little more than a Puritan bias: Bad things happen to people who eat bad things."

It does seem like a historically negative take on diet and nutrition.

2) NPR noted that people tend to eat in front of the TV but people tend not to eat while listening to the radio. They went on to suggest that radio might just be good for your health.

Funny, but there is probably some truth to it.

Oops

I did not get around to posting here yesterday, but I did post on another blog. I am a bit sad about the fact that I missed it, but there was a lot going on yesterday and I ended up falling asleep. But a good conversation with a good friend is a good reason to let blogging slip my mind.

I am reposting my tumblr post below (and using the time stamp from over there). I hope it's ok to "fudge" a little bit.

• Reporter: I know a lot of homeless sleep on heating grates in cold areas of the country. Does that harm them in any way?
• Doctor: No, they are just sleeping on them to try and keep warm.
• Reporter: So it doesn't get too hot or cause any kind of complications?
• Doctor: No.
• Reporter: When you practice "street medicine" do you try to keep them from sleeping on the grates?
• Doctor: [pause] No, it can really be a matter of life or death for people living on the streets in cold climates.

I usually like to keep tumblr light but my last few posts over there have been things that have shocked me. I really can't understand how the reporter could miss the point so completely. I suppose when you are warm and well-fed it's not so easy to understand the immediate problems other people might be facing.

Main street

The road to our house was blocked off by police cars all night. Apparently a man was holed up in his house and armed with weapons. The news said police "had taken cover behind their cars." Main Street was apparently being swarmed with Middletown SWAT.

Later we heard four separate loud bangs that were more than an hour apart from the first to the last. You would think that a "shoot out" would be many loud bangs in quick succession.

Still, now we're wondering if those two things are related.

Post election emotions

I am suprised at how much of a roller coaster day it has been: from getting a little teary watching Maya Angelou get choked up about the election, to feeling bad for McCain's bad luck and bad decisions, from feeling inspired by the possibilities of a new direction after listening to Obama's victory speech, to becoming completely horrified and outraged at Nader's comments, and then finally to laughing at South Park's election perspective.

Overall, I was really touched and amazed that so many people were so choked up about the election's result. But I have to wonder...did the historic nature of the election's result just hit people at the end--including the reporters? And was that because no one really believed it would happen? And if so, what does that say in itself?