Tag: general grumbling

You can take your new era and shove it.

How I used to read the paper seven days a week:  a bundle of a paper was delivered to my doorstep and I read it.
How I will read the paper 3 of seven days per week:  supposedly on my tiny phone.
 
Except the stupid digital version doesn’t work on my phone.  That blue square is where the content is supposed to be.  You know, because we are calling it “content” now, not “news”.
 

Memo to middle-aged mom: No. One. Cares.


I’m writing this more than a month after I snapped the picture of this article/headline and I’m still annoyed.  I understand that teenagers feel like everyone is watching them.  It’s a developmental stage and they grow out of it.  I have much less patience for adults who think the world is their audience, when the world could care less.  Either wear the two-piece or don’t, but don’t inflict your psychodrama on the rest of us.  Geez.

Exact words!!!


I’m quibbling here with the term “inner-city.”  I know by “inner-city” they are using shorthand to describe the bad part of town where opportunities are few and mostly people of color live.  That place, when Mitchell Jackson was growing up in Portland was not the inner city, it was in Northeast Portland.  Inner city is over by the Keller Auditorium and is rather nice today, and then.

Hard times for readers of the Oregonian.


Our full-time movie critic (Shawn Levy) has been gone for more than a year, but this week we said goodbye to our theater critic, Marty Hughley.  Last week it was the music guy, Ryan White, a reporter I always read, even though I never listened to the music he was writing about, because he was such a good writer.

The point of having a full-time critic is that I get to know their preferences and that helps inform a decision if what they are talking about is something I might be interested in.  Having a bunch of part-timers is not helpful in getting anything done but giving a summary.

The thing I hate most about this transition is that the Oregonian refuses to acknowledge that they are settling for a lesser product.

I knew this day was coming and I’m still sad.


Thanks to the Willamette Week tipping me off to the fact the Oregonian would cease seven-day publishing, I’ve had since January to adjust to the fact I will not be whipping through my newspaper every morning.  I’ll still be reading, most likely on my phone, but it just won’t be the same.

Only Twenty Dollars?

Kristyn Schiavone is a new-ish fashion columnist in our paper and I’m on the fence about whether I like her or not.  Cons:  she’s not local (she seems to be out of Chicago), her writing style is a bit too “sorority girl” for me, and she’s quite peppy.  Granted, those last two might be a given with fashion columnists.  Pros:  Um, I keep reading her?
 
But today a sentence in the article took my breath away.  Check out #4.

Only twenty dollars?  To me, a fully-employed professional, there is no “only” about a twenty dollar bill. There’s not really an “only” about a five-dollar bill in my world.  So to read that a manicure is “only” twenty dollars is pretty jarring.  I think columnists/commentators make this mistake a lot.  They think that all their readers are in the same demographic as they are.  It’s not a good thing.

They HAVE run their course.


Hey look!  The Oregonian wants to know if Ziggy and Family Circus have run their course.  Really?  Do you  need to ask?  In fact, while we are on the topic, here’s a list of  other daily comics that have run their course:
Hagar the Horrible
Blondie
Wizard of ID
Hi and Lois
Peanuts (sorry to say, but it’s true)
Garfield
Freshly Squeezed

Oregonian readers are blessed with two full pages of daily comics.  How about making them all comics of note, not warmed-over plots that have been recirculating for years.

Our Heritage?

Celebrate “Rip City style” by honoring the Trail Blazers 80’s teams. 
Players will wear special Rip City jerseys to honor our heritage.

Now me, I think of “my heritage” as something that happened far in the past, like the fact that my great-grandmother had 15 children, or my grandfather died when my dad was a teenager, or that my other grandfather was born in New Hampshire, but grew up in Greece.  I don’t think of my “heritage” as something that happened less that 35 years ago.  That’s not a heritage, that’s the recent past.

Interestingly, here’s the definition from Dictionary.com

her·it·age

  [her-i-tij]  Show IPA

noun

1.

something that comes or belongs to one by reason of birth; an inherited lot or portion: a heritage ofpoverty and suffering; a national heritage of honor, pride, and courage.
2.

something reserved for one: the heritage of the righteous.
3.

Law.

a.

something that has been or may be inherited by legal descent or succession.
b.

any property, especially land, that devolves by right of inheritance.

Can we really say that our pro basketball team came to us by birth?