I might have been suffering from temporary insanity, but I went shopping today. On Black Friday. The goal was to complete my holiday gift shopping in 6 hours or less.
It started at 5:30 a.m. No, I was not shopping. I was being woken from my sleep by a text from my sister, who does not love to shop. But, today, she and her husband Jason decided to brave the crowds and start shopping as soon as the doors opened. I, however, decided to sleep in until 7.
At 7:30 a.m. my mom and I left the house. As my mom was driving, I was speed-reading the sale papers and sipping on hot chocolate. We went to Wal-Mart, Target, Kohls, Old Navy and then T.J. Maxx and Best Buy. We made purchases everywhere except Best Buy, which had been decimated by early morning shoppers. It was an eerie sight: there were near-empty DVD bins everywhere and check-out lines were outlined on the floor beginning at the back corner of the store. Everywhere else, we got great deals. I got an Elmo toy for Ellie, an art set for Maddie, a Cranium board game for myself (the last one on the shelf, too), and a few other items which can't be mentioned for security purposes.
Black Friday
A Few Rare and Archaic Words
For your reading pleasure. Definitions from the OED.
dufter, n. a. A bundle of official papers; a register, record. b. A business office.
meandriform, adj. Having a winding form; labyrinthine.
interfulgent, adj. Shining among or between.
dupery, a. The action or practice of duping; deception, trickery b. The condition of one who is duped.
egestuous, adj. Very poor and needy (Also egestuose).
eclaircise, v. trans. To clear up.
diswig, v. trans. To deprive of a wig.
You're/Your Confusion
Pittsburgh Proposes Tuition Tax
Well, it seems that the folks in Pittsburgh have a creative new idea to raise money for the failing city budget. The mayor of the city plans to impose a 1 percent tax on college tuition as part of his 2010 budget proposal. This makes me angry.
One percent of tuition would range from $20, at the city's cheapest university, to $400 at the pricey Carnegie Mellon. That doesn't seem like much, but when universities are already nickle-and-diming college students to death with student fees and tuition hikes, it adds up. Twenty dollars! That's roughly 10 meals from the McDonald's dollar menu. To a college student, that's a big deal.
During a recession, should we really be penalizing college students for going to college? If Pittsburgh is really struggling, why not put a city-wide tax on non-energy efficient items (like incandescent light bulbs or gas-guzzling cars) to promote going green? Oh, no, that would get everybody angry, not just the college students.
I sincerely hope that Pittsburgh doesn't go through with this.
Horse-Race Health Care Coverage
We often think of horse-race style coverage as it applies to Presidential elections. During the "heat of the battle," the media often get caught up in a style of coverage that focuses on who is ahead. First Obama is ahead in the polls, then McCain gains some ground. McCain's supporters run an attack ad, then Obama runs a counter-attack ad, then McCain makes a counter-counter speech, then Obama... you get the idea. This kind of coverage continually focuses on the back and forth conflict between candidates, and important issues are sometimes lost in the shuffle.
It seems to me that this same style of coverage is now filtering into other topics, specifically the current health care debate. The New York Times released an article today with the headline "Democrats Raise Alarms Over Costs of Health Bills." The entire article is about Democrats who are saying that the current bills in Congress don't go far enough to address out-of-control health care costs. The article is well written and well reported, but taken in context with other stories, it casts light on a particular aspect of the health care coverage.
Fact-checking Web sites
The world has a lot of noise. There are now an uncountable number of Web sites across the internet. Millions of bloggers around the world, just like me, are writing about everything under the sun. And this is added to the traditional media - newspapers, radio and television. Everyone has something to say about everything, and, thanks to modern technology, everyone now has a means to express their opinions.
So how do we, as ordinary readers, sort through the barrage of information? How do we separate fact from fiction? Enter fact-checking Web sites.
Does Congress really do anything?
An Associated Press article appeared on the New York Times website today with the headline "Citizenship for Polish Hero of American Revolution." According to the article, Obama signed a joint resolution of Congress on Friday that made Gen. Casimir Pulaski, a polish soldier who died 230 years ago in the American Resolution, an honorary citizen of the United States.
A quick search of THOMAS, a bill database created by the Library of Congress, reveals more frivolous resolutions in Congress. For example, House Resolution 397, introduced in May 2009: "Affirming the rich spiritual and religious history of our Nation's founding and subsequent history and expressing support for designation of the first week in May as `America's Spiritual Heritage Week' for the appreciation of and education on America's history of religious faith." But wait, there's more! Senate Resolution 72, introduced in March: "Expressing the sense of the Senate regarding drug trafficking in Mexico." At this one involves a somewhat relevant topic. More recently, in October there were no less than two resolutions "supporting the goals and ideals of National Domestic Violence Awareness Month," etc.