Childhood Reflux

Not a good couple of days for memories. (Links do not contain videos, although I'm not responsible for ads.)

First this: Fear and Loathing in Dyker Heights. Ages 9-17 in the belly of this environment. I knew/know almost everyone in the article. I've known about the story for years, but other than a New York Times article on the lawsuit, this is the most national coverage of the horrid events that occurred at my school while I was there to people I knew well. Not that there's any winner in this kind of comparison, but I think the scope of what happened at my alma mater was far greater and more sinister than what happened at Penn State.

Next: Two Thousand Maniacs! My then-stepbrothers and I were exposed to this movie as the second half of a Kung Fu-led double feature in about 1975. We walked out after 15 or so minutes -- no small feat of revulsion for a piece of content plopped in front of three teenage boys with high tolerances for weirdness in some crumbling old theater on Staten Island. I'm now indexing a book that uses this seminal horror/gore/slasher film to further its point. Hallelujah. After avoiding the film for 40 years, I now know the rest of the story.

The good old days

Are good and gone now.

That's why they're good,

Because they're gone.

--Loudon Wainwright III

Mind of an Indexer

To authors who concisely summarize all their arguments in the last two pages of each chapter:

1. Thanks, because I don't index summaries that add nothing new to the argument. I also don't generally index questions, so I love seeing a paragraph full of them.

2. If you started out using concise terms rather than ending with them, my life would be much easier.

And thanks to all for accurate subheads. For inaccurate ones, a pox on you and the editor.

Spain, Impressions 2

Wine is as cheap or cheaper than water or Coca-Cola in Spain. We spent more in the TGIFriday's at the Atlanta airport coming back than we did for all but one of our meals in Europe.

I was listening to an incredibly tedious Canadian couple on a 2-hour bus ride talk about their travels (thankfully they were talking to someone else), and how it was cheaper for them to go to Europe than to come to the US for travel. Once you got past the plane ticket, lodging and food were far less expensive in a small city in Europe than for the same in the US -- and over the course of a week or so, it adds up.

I also never quite figured out tipping in Spain. I don't think it's common. To wit, when you hand them your plastic, there's no line for adding a gratuity. And staying off the computer, I never bothered looking it up, nor did we get a straight answer from anyone we asked, including the locals.

So when you consider already inexpensive food and wine, and you're not throwing 20 percent on top of it . . . makes for a thrifty-by-comparison vacation.

As does having someone else pay for airfare and lodging.

Innocence and Experience

I wasn't going to post the following quote, as it's a bit humbling, but I loved the response it generated.

From an author for whom I've done one index -- although we struck up a fast friendship while doing so:

XXX is a good egg, and I think you'd like her book. I hope it works out for the two of you to work together. I told her the truth about you: that I've met no one better at their job than you are at yours. Also, how easy, fun and stimulating it is to work with you.

 

I passed that comment along to a managing editor for whom I've done hundreds of indexes, copyedits, and proofreads. The response?

 

You are good, but you are very strange...

Latest Celebrity Stalking

Blogger, Jonathan Richman, Mrs. Blogger

Impressions, Spain 1

You can listen to this while you read (or not). John Coltrane, "Impressions."

Between a week in Spain, with a one-day trip to Tangier, and the more recent events in los Estados Unidos, I've got material for a year. On the matter of silver linings, the 2016 presidential election and its aftermath should be a boon to the scholarly publishing industry for the rest of my productive lifetime.

-- which, according the Ratsnest [Facebook], ended yesterday, as I was caught up in the SNAFU of FB posting death messages on people's accounts:

Remembering [insert social media nom here] . . .

We hope people who love Jim will find comfort in the things others share to remember and celebrate his life.

That was news to my long-suffering wife, who thought I was somewhere in the house working. My 27-year-old son originally was puzzled and then found that some of his contacts were experiencing the same thing. I told him to keep his zombie friends offa my lawn.

Spain . . . 

We were on the southern coast in the town of Torremolinos, near the city of Malaga. Right on the Mediterranean. Nice place. Cheap food. Wine is cheaper than water or Coca-Cola.

Reluctant capitalist that I am, I was pondering what would make me rich in Europe. Two franchises: cigarettes and hair gel. European males under the age of 35 don't know how to leave their hair alone. I am convinced that hair salons in Europe are papered with Skate Park Magazine, because that's what many European men's and boy's heads look like. Some little kids had hair styles that probably would have scarred me for life. Hell, I think I wept after leaving the barber's chair until I was about 12 years old. In my head: "But, Mom, I just want to be a hippie."

Pick an angle, any angle. Maybe two.

More to come.