Friday, February 05, 2010

In Case You Were Wondering What to Call the Blizzard of 2010



Snowpocalypse
Snowmaggeden
Flurricane
Kaiser Snowze
The Big Snowbowski
Snowtorious B.I.G.
Yoshimi Battles the Pink Snowbots
Snowhammad Ali
Shovel-Ready Stimulus Project
Snowtopia
Snowly Crap!
Snowlocaust

Wednesday, February 03, 2010

Ethics Schmethics

"A major British medical journal on Tuesday retracted a flawed study linking the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine to autism and bowel disease...

For the study, Wakefield took blood samples from children at his son's birthday party, paying them 5 pounds each ($8) for their contributions and later joking about the incident."

I realize the urge to use your kids birthday parties to advance your employment must be irresistible. After all, my mom used to make me have parties at her knitting store. But turning junior's festivities into a de facto blood bank seems a little extreme.

Tuesday, February 02, 2010

Emily Post Offers No Advice in this Situation

A friend of my friend, we'll call her "Elaine", invited me to be friends on Facebook some time ago. I don't think we had any contact after that time. About a month ago, she defriended me. However, our mutual friend's Facebook page shows that "Elaine" just had twins, one of whom has my name.

Is that weird? I do not exactly have the most common name. It's more the kind of name people's great-great-grandmothers have, or perhaps that special nun who used to beat them at Catholic school. It seems that there was not a lot of coincidence involved, particularly given the timely defriending.

Is my name going to be the newest hipster old-is-new name to give your kids, like Hannah or Emma?

Either way, I'm not thrilled. At least when my neighbor named her cat after mine, she gave me the courtesy of friending me on Facebook and then inviting me over to meet the kitten and have tea.

Oh well. I guess that kid is set up for a pretty awesome life, if her namesake is any indication. Bah, who am I kidding? You know their second choice for a baby name was probably Rimbaud.