Dave Barry on newspaper industry

I love Dave Barry but I haven't thought of him in years. Here's part of a column called "Get me rewrite!" he wrote for the Miami Herald in 2001 but was re-run in yesterday's Herald. I particularly love his suggestion for a paper's cost-cutting motto: "All the News That."

yada, yada, yada ...

The newspaper industry spread to America, where, by the 20th century, virtually every town had a locally owned newspaper with a name like The Chronic Prevaricator or The Register-Sphincter, which kept the community abreast of local politics (''City Council Attacked by Pig'') as well as national issues (''Strom Thurmond Still Alive''). These were family operations run by people who were less concerned about making large profits than about keeping their body parts out of the presses.

But in the past few decades, all of these newspapers were purchased by large corporations, which were in turn purchased by larger corporations, and so on, so that today the entire American newspaper industry has been glommed together into one giant media conglomerate owned by Wall Street, which frankly does not care what your city council did. What Wall Street cares about is profits. Here at the newspaper, we get hourly phone calls from Wall Street.

''Send more profits!'' Wall Street shouts, then slams down the receiver.

We must comply, because otherwise Wall Street would shut down the newspaper and we would starve to death, because, as English majors, we have no useful skills.

I believe we do have useful skills - we just don't want to employ them. We'll even deny we have them, if necessary. "I know nothing about QuickBooks," for example.

Walk, or use a Pedicab, when you can

This report on CNN is something to think about. The story is about kids with asthma and pollution.

Children are more vulnerable to the effects of air pollution because their lungs don't fully form until they are adolescents, the American Academy of Pediatrics noted ...

Outdoor irritants range from pollen to cold air (?) to air pollution. (My question mark.)

Michael Chang, an atmospheric research scientist at Georgia Tech in Atlanta, estimated that 50 percent of air pollutants are created by cars and trucks.

He explained many parts of the U.S. are now transitioning to higher temperatures and more humid summers.

"We don't have the winds that blow things out of the air," Chang said. "The stuff we put into the atmosphere lingers longer."

He compared the air quality in many big cities to a chemical soup of thousands of compounds, including ground-level ozone and fine particulate matter. The Environmental Protection Agency describes ground-level ozone as the primary component of smog. It includes motor vehicle exhaust, industrial emissions, gasoline vapors and chemical solvents.

We, of course, do not live in a big city, but we've got that wonderful landfill and its hydrogen sulfide emissions that go who knows where.

When I belonged to Tufts Healthcare a few years ago, I received a newsletter that basically said if you jog during rush hour, you inhale toxins equal to smoking a whole pack of cigarettes - or more, depending on the traffic.

"Jogging late in the afternoon during the summer is not the best time," Chang said. "Ground-level ozone is at its worst at that time of day."

(Georgia pediatrician Avril) Beckford goes one step further, warning parents to not choose a house, school or playground that is close to a busy road or a highway.

Another fight over an "iconic" building

Things are getting hot in the issue of the one remaining clam shack in town and one man's right to make it into a home. As in, does he have the right?

The Daily News is right on it and this issue continues the battle between the Mayor and Ward 1 City Councillor Larry McCavitt, which was escalated a month or so ago when the Mayor called McCavitt "a bully" because he was trying to get folks to adhere to state laws regarding Commonwealth waterways (that's my take on it anyway).

The Mayor kind of backtracked to me and said he felt McCavitt was trying to force his views down everyone's throat (which he also says in today's DN story). But I notice that the tag "bully" is still being bandied about.

McCavitt, by the way, was involved in writing or at least re-writing Chapter 91 law regarding public waterways. So he's not an expert or anything.

I don't know who this Roland guy is or why the Mayor is taking such an intense interest in the matter. He got the city's legal advisor, Kopelman and Paige, to render an opinion (dated Sept. 18, 2007), which says:

"Without a court decree, Roland's claim of title by adverse possession is not record title and does not constitute proof of ownership ... Since Roland cannot even prove that he has any right of record to even enter onto the Property, let alone establish good title to the Property, it is difficult to see what hardship, if any, Roland would suffer were he not allowed to convert the summer cottage into a year-round single family residence ... it is my opinion that the ZBA may properly find that Roland is not entitled to a variance."

What the heck? We got REAL problems in this city and we're wasting time and money on this after a legal opinion has already been obtained? Unless Roland came up with some real proof that he owns the property, which it does not seem that he did, why not tell him to come back when he does have the proof?

And what's with all these meetings the Mayor has with special interests?

McCavitt says the new hearings are the result of a "secret" meeting in which Mayor John Moak and a city solicitor met with Roland and his attorney. He said the meeting was designed to find a way to get the matter back before the board.

First Moak raised a ruckus by proposing a private meeting between the City Council and Stephen Karp, now a major property owner in the downtown.

But I think even before that, he was meeting with marina owners to discuss matters relating to proposed new mooring regulations. Private marinas, if I recall correctly, rent the majority of the city's moorings in the river.

Moak said a taxpayer came to him who didn't believe he received a fair shake at the hearing because of filing errors. The mayor said since he is not an attorney and stays neutral in such cases, he called in the city solicitor to help make a determination, which was to have new hearings.

Can a person who can't even prove he owns a property really tie up city government like this? Seems he can - the hearings start at 7:30 p.m. tomorrow in council chambers.

Earth Day farmer's market

I toddled on over to the farmer's market, held at Bartlet Mall yesterday. I was there really early, like when it had just opened, but there were a lot of folks already there and many more heading in as I was heading out.

I had to chuckle when Pettengill Farms' huge central display, a large shallow pot full of plants, was purchased and hauled off within minutes of the open of the market, leaving a big gap on the table.

I got some plants for my window boxes at a good price (I'd been shopping around during the week) and came home happy to have filled the boxes for just $5.

On my way back to the car, which I had parked in the Green St. lot, I ran into Jeremy who owns Grand Trunk (the wonderful cheese shop and my favorite place) with his wife. He had also just returned from the market.

We agreed that it would be wonderful to have a regular farmer's market on the Mall. Clearly it would be a popular event for a Sat. and/or Sun. I believe last summer someone proposed such a thing but it was shot down.

And Newburyport Pedicab made a pre-season showing to run people laden with purchases back to their cars or homes. I hope it was as successful as it looked to be.

Return of the mummy, with a new nose

If you plan to get plastic surgery and don't want to upset your kids too much, here's a new children's book to help the kids adjust to mommy going to the hospital and coming home all bandaged up.

Or, you know, warp their impressionable little minds forever.

(Italicized text from the Newsweek story.)

Written and self-published by a Florida plastic surgeon, this book tells the story of a mommy who gets a tummy tuck, a nose job and breast implants. Before her surgery the mom explains that she is getting a smaller tummy: "You see, as I got older, my body stretched and I couldn't fit into my clothes anymore. Dr. Michael is going to help fix that and make me feel better." Mom comes home looking like a slightly bruised Barbie doll with demure bandages on her nose and around her waist.

(Dr. Michael) Salzhauer got the idea for a book after noticing that women were coming into his office with their kids in tow. He says that mysterious doctor's visits can be frightening for children. "Parents generally tend to go into this denial thing. They just try to ignore the kids' questions completely." But, he adds, children "fill in the blanks in their imagination" and then feel worse when they see "mommy with bandages," he says. "With the tummy tucks, [the mothers] can't lift anything. They're in bed. The kids have questions."

The text doesn't mention the breast augmentation, but the illustrations intentionally show Mom's breasts to be fuller and higher ... The book doesn't explain exactly why the mother is redoing her nose post-pregnancy. Nonetheless, Mom reassures her little girl that the new nose won't just look "different, my dear—prettier!"

Seems like there must be a better way to tell your child what's going on without making it about self esteem. I can't think of one right now.

Congratulations Stephen

It seems that our own Stephen Tait of the Daily News was runner-up for reporter of the year at CNHI newspaper company. CNHI owns 100 papers nationally so to be even a finalist was a great achievement.

Although it may seem I take every opportunity to bitch and moan about the DN, I have a great deal of respect for Stephen as a fellow journalist and a fellow Michigander.

Congratulations, Stephen! I bow in the general direction of Fruit St.

Steeped in pop culture

I saw this headline on Boston.com and immediately thought that Bruce Springsteen was a true-blue Katie Couric fan:

Boss backs Couric

Springsteen has, however, endorsed Barack Obama. So I guess it wasn't a terribly off-the-mark assumption on my part. It's Couric's boss who is backing her, in this case.

Couric may get a boost in her ratings, however, now that so many people are peeved at ABC over the Democratic debate the other night.

Attraction

I have always been fascinated by people and finding out their motivations for doing what they do. I do believe that's why I am so taken with the character of Bartleby in the movie "Dogma" - also a watcher.

I like to look at a couple and guess what the attraction is/was. Sometimes it's really obvious; most of the times it's a mystery. When I get to know the people better, I sometimes ask. The result of one of my queries is detailed below.

First there's the blonde thing. I don't know if that began with movie stars like Jean Harlow in the 1930s or if it began in the 1960s when music was enjoining everyone to be a California blond(e).

I believe the thin thing began when runway models became supermodels. Twiggy probably did more for diet products than any other marketing possible. We had a discussion on Ari Herzog's blog about young impressionable people and smoking. I think a lot of people are much more impressionable than most people imagine.

Then there's the women with wide mouths thing. Think about it for a minute. This was actually confirmed by my (now ex-)boyfriend, who was very candid about his reasons for being attracted to a woman. He, by the way, really liked Gina Davis - a thin, dark-haired woman with a wide mouth.

Men who are vertically challenged usually go for a woman who is shorter than he. The man in a couple I once knew said (when asked) that he had looked for a woman with long hair who really liked the Red Sox (the shorter than him I just inferred).

I replied that he was lucky, then, that he found (name of his wife). Everyone was shocked that I had said that; but what I meant was that he was lucky to have found a woman with long hair who liked the Red Sox who was also smart and funny, to name just two of her attributes that I felt merited more comment than the long hair and the Red Sox love.

A woman I once knew said what she loved most about the man she was about to marry was that he loved her so much. Needless to say, they are now divorced. When she finally grew up, she found someone who she loved for themself, not herself. I feel deeply for the ex-husband, although he should have seen that one coming.

A couple more women have told me that they like men who really love them, or who think they are great, etc. Conversely, my ex-boyfriend once told me early on in our relationship that he had me on a pedestal. I think the fact that I fell off the pedestal is one reason why I'm still here and he is not.

Is love really blind? Maybe.

A long time ago, when I was young and still living in Michigan, a woman I knew only slightly was telling me about the man whose proposal of marriage she had just accepted.

"He wasn't my type at all," she said about when she first met him. "But I thought 'what the heck?' I'd give him a chance anyway."

When I was young, and even now, I think of the physical "type" that attracts me as being dark haired and dark eyed. I also am attracted to high cheekbones, which makes Johnny Depp my perceived ideal. And I'm big on voices.

To the horror of my sister (the one who lives in Gloucester), I always loved the voice of Steve Perry, former lead singer of Journey.

Recently I confessed that not only did I like his voice, I also found him physically attractive. "It was bad enough you like his voice!" she exclaimed. "Now you're telling me you think he's attractive??"

Oops.

Both of my long-terms relationships, however, have been with men who had red or light brown hair and blue eyes. So there you go.

Don't let me down, honey

And just when I thought that my vista was golden in hue,
One thousand umbrellas opened to spoil my view

That's how the men who are the subjects of their ex-wives' blogs must feel. Check it out in this piece in today's NY Times.

Women (and men, actually) are airing all the dirty laundry of their failed marriages online.

Until the morning her husband, David Sals, told her he “was done” with their marriage, Jennifer Neal had portrayed him so lovingly on her blog that he was called DearSweetDave. By the afternoon of that October day last year, Ms. Neal had shared what she portrayed as his perfidy with the 55,000 regular readers she says visit NakedJencom.

Gee, I can't think why people would be attracted to a site called NakedJencom.

Anyway ... well ... rather than waiting for the release of the Lifetime movie next year, maybe I should air my dirty laundry about my failed relationship with the Current right here. And all my other failed relationships, such as they are.

“The bloggers who are doing the best are those who are injecting their personal lives,” said Penelope Trunk, the author of the Brazen Careerist blog, who has written frequently in the past year about the collapse of her 15-year marriage.

But there may be a downside:

There will certainly be consequences down the line of all this sharing. “The long-term impact of the persistent information on line has not been fully felt,” Ms. Madden said.

Persistent information? Is that a bad thing?

For the moment, the courts appear to be on the side of the bloggers. First Amendment and all that stuff.

To collect or not to collect?

Why is there even any debate? If the people used the water, they owe the city the dough, or at least some portion of it.

Councillor Brian Derrivan had this to say to the Daily News:

"It seems to me if it was a problem with the city's equipment, then it is the city's responsibility," he said. "You can't trust the equipment, you can't trust the person taking the readings, if they were even taking the readings."

Hey, that's great news for the people on Plum Island, who had to pay higher betterments than anticipated due to admitted mismanagement of the water/sewer project. All homeowners got out here was an embarassed version of "too bad."