Romantic Comedy wizard

 

As the number seven world authority on romantic comedies I am constantly asked to recommend romantic comedies to desperate people keen to find a good romantic comedy in a world that disdains them. And as a great adorer of the romantic comedy I am always happy to oblige. There are few situations in which I am not happy to grill a person on their Romantic Comedy preferences, general movie tastes, historical reading patterns, preferred acting styles, taste in music, and endless related questions for hours, all to determine the perfectly tailored for them to watch romantic comedy movie. 

But there are only so many hours in a single day!

And there are only so few of me!

And if, hypothetically, more than three people a year asked me for a romantic comedy recommendation, or, um, a lot more than three, hypothetically again, I would need a back up plan.

This is the back up plan!

In this very blog post I have created a series of wildly varying and diverse scenarios that will lead you to the perfect romantic comedy. If any of the following scenarios are true for you, simply click the link below it, and your carefully selected movie will appear before your eyes.

One day, in the months to come, the true romantic comedy connoisseur will find their way to my future Romantic Comedy Finder website that the popularity of this prototype will lead to. After that, desperately in search of more romantic comedies, you will be lining up at my library to receive my one on one advice. 

By then you will be so far gone you will be easy prey for my extremely advanced suggestions like When in Rome, or Sidney White.  

But we get ahead of ourselves. Let us start at the beginning:

1. I hate romantic comedies and never watch them. But I am naturally embarrassed by how poorly this reflects upon me. Maybe if I watch just one really good romantic comedy, that has complexity and is well made, I could like it and begin to be a whole person. And then, maybe, slowly, I can begin to love again.

Try this one!

2. I've seen a few romantic comedies, the ones people talk about: When Harry Met Sally, that one that won best picture, and they didn't do much for me. Do they get better?

Yes they do! Here you go.

3. I have seen loads of romantic comedies and am always looking for something new, but until they make a new one, what should I watch again?

This one definitely bears rewatching!

4. I've liked a few romantic comedies, but sometimes they get a little, I don't know, cutesy. Is there a romantic comedy with a bit of...  salt? Something a bit... off center?

Sure, try this one.

5. I am acclaimed actor Christian Bale and I disdain romantic comedies. I read your post a couple years ago making fun of me. But until I see a romantic comedy movie that makes me burn with shame over my dismissive comments, I must continue mocking everything you love.

I throw down the gauntlet!

6. I'm bored. I'm depressed. I want a movie that delights me with no effort on my part. Silly, absurd, romantic, lay it on me. Oh, it should take place in beautiful, glamorous New York.

Okay.

There. That ought to get you started. I think you'll find there's something for everyone here. 

You're on your way.

How to fix a stapler

I have worked at a library for a quarter of a century. And for the whole of that time I have been the supplies person. So I have ordered a lot of staplers. Nevertheless I prefer to fix staplers rather than buy them. It's more respectful of the taxpayers and of the environment. And because I have fixed so many staplers over the years I have become extremely knowledgeable about the process. One might even say that I have mastered the art.

Fortunately the stapler is a simple device, strictly designed to do one basic thing: staple. Also fortunately, in the course of my vast stapler repair work, I have devised one extremely easy, fool-proofed method that will resolve any stapler problem, whether it be from parts failure or from the more common "Jam".

Just follow this one painless method and even the most stapler and mechanically illiterate among you will have your staplers humming along like never before.

I have broken this simple method down into 22 basic, easy to understand steps.



1. Firmly grasp the manifold flange in your right hand.

2. Decouple the sprocket cylinder.

3. Turn on your Kinsey 3000 home forge system and dial to "7".

4. Prepare three measure-weight r-2's for proper induction.

5. Remove all staples, using pliers if necessary. Discard.

6. Put the staple hinge to your good ear and listen for a hum.

7. No hum? Go to step 11.

8. Brush the flange hinge in acetone or mineral oil.

9. Burn a large smudge stick of white sage.

10. Wave the stapler around in the smoke.

11. Induct the measure-weight r-2's until ideally pliable.

12. Pour yourself a cup of coffee and sit down and read Descartes masterwork Meditations of First Philosophy. If in a hurry to staple, skim.

13. Make sure you have a few paperclips for just in case.

14. Attempt to mold the measure-weights into a standard "flange" fringe.

15. Hit the table in frustration and cry out "Tu me prends la tete!"

16. Solder stapler parts "seven" and "nine" lightly together at join knobs, something you would not have to do if stapler designers weren't idiots!

17. Put on your HazMat suit.

18. Split all the atoms in the gear sprocket spring, loosening the jibbit as you go.

19. Wait for the stapler base to cool as it will be as hot as the Sun for a short while. This is not a colorful turn of speech. Maybe go ahead and loosen your HazMat while waiting.

20. Dip your stapler in liquid hydrogen for a few seconds to "set" the new metals.

21. Add new staples to your stapler.

22. Staple stuff!




Congratulations! You just saved yourself $6.99 on the cost of a new stapler! 

Please note this guide only works on the Bostitch Office B210R. 

For the Swingline Optima please see my post: How to fix any stapler. For the Paper Pro Compact Classic see my post: Stapler fixing in just a few simple steps. And for the Kokuyo Harinacs models see my series of monographs on modern Japanese staplers and their repair, published by Cambridge University Press but now out of print. Don't ask me why they're out of print, but one can usually find a few copies of them on Abe Books for astronomical prices. Good luck.

Your guide to the Coronavirus

Thank you for coming here to get answers to all your many important questions about the Coronavirus. We are monitoring the situation closely and updating our information here on a round the clock basis.




Q.  Why should I come here for vital health information on Coronavirus? Wouldn't I be better off on the government's CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) website where they even have their own trademarked motto:

CDC 24/7: Saving Lives, Protecting People


A.  Yes, you should absolutely go to the CDC, if you're a Commie! But if you believe in our great, free market system, like an American, stay here! We have a motto too:

I'm a glass half full kind of guy even if it's actually empty.


Q.  So, my question is, do I have Coronavirus?


A.  Please register and enter your credit card information in the space below to continue

EMAIL  __________________________
PASSWORD ___________________
REENTER PASSWORD __________________________
NAME ON CREDIT CARD __________________________
CREDIT CARD # ______________________________


Q.   So, do I have the Coronavirus? My throat kind of itches.


A.   Ha ha ha ha. No, of course you don't have the Coronavirus! But I have to go wash my hands. And maybe burn down my website. But you'll probably be fine. Don't contact me again in any way for at least a year unless you're at a distance of a minimum of 100 miles. Drink plenty of fluids. Take care of yourself. We love you. Goodbye. 


Q.   What can I do to prevent getting Coronavirus?


A.   Well, the CDC recomm, er, I mean, my research shows that you should wash your hands a lot in warm, soapy water, then put gloves on, then another pair of gloves. Then wrap large, terrycloth bath towels around your gloved hands. Then make your way alone to a desert island, in the middle of the Atlantic, not the Pacific. Oh no, not the Pacific at all.


Q.   Is it Coronavirus, or THE Coronavirus?


A.   We're sort of waiting to see. Currently it's a novel Coronavirus, 2019-nCoV.


Q.   Should we panic?


A.   No. No, no, no. Ha ha. Just remain clam. Ha ha. The CDC has not even declared it an International Health Concern. Not yet at least, although I'm pretty sure they're going to on Thursday. But just remain calm. Remain calm and stop touching stuff. Everything is just fine.  Just don't touch it. Just leave your face alone, okay, and wash your hands. And stop coughing. Please stop coughing. Oh god, the coughing! Why? Whyyyyyy?????  We're all too young to die!!!

So you want to read a blog!

So you were thinking "Hey, I'm on the Internet all the time looking for socks and doing my job and stuff, maybe I should have something regular to read for my entertainment and edification. Maybe I should read a blog!"

Welcome to 2008!

It's a wonderful, optimistic sort of year. There are tons of blogs! There are blogs to suit every possible interes...

Ooops. They're gone. Everyone lost interest. They are all gone.

Also, come to think of it, the planet is boiling, and the year is 2020 anyway. But those seven weeks back in 2008, the blog era, were wonderful. I get misty eyed thinking of it.

But don't despair! You can still read a blog. There is still, believe it or not, one left.

"One left!" You cry. "But it's hopeless. I'm already 12 years out of date on the Internet. How can I ever find the one, tiny blog left on the whole of the huge, sprawling, giant, impossible Internet?"

Hmmm. Good point.

How to judge a coffee shop

Decades and decades ago, or something like that, my wife and I went to Rome and fell under the spell of coffee shops. Il caffe, as they maybe say in Italy. I'm not sure, mainly because they're speaking in Italian. Nevertheless they have brilliant coffee places in Rome, but they are of a different style than those in America, most of which weren't very good at the time. Fortunately, shortly after our dawning interest we suddenly began to see the first iterations of excellent U.S. cafes in our own twin towns, led at first by Kopplins in St. Paul, and then followed by lesser (albeit some quite good) others. But this is still American Capitalism, and quality is ever the exception. And while coffee shops are everywhere in America, tracking down good ones can still be a challenge.

We mostly stick to our local favorites, but sometimes we wander far afield, and sometimes we stumble upon some coffee shop and wander in, asking "Should we get a drink here?"

Superficially it can be hard to tell. Fortunately, if you know the signifiers to look for, it can be pretty easy to tell. I am here to help.

I mean, if you want help. If you don't want help you should read this anyway because, um, in for a penny, in for a pound. Or, on the other hand: where else are you going to go on the Internet? The Internet, feh. To quote John Lennon:


The dream is over
What can I say?
The dream is over
Yesterday



But don't worry. I'll still weave dreams for you. I am totally the walrus now. And in today's dream I have two complimentary lists for you:

Three things that will tell you a coffee shop is not great

1. Packaged snack food of any kind available for purchase.

Yes, a place with interesting, organic chips is likely to be better than a place selling Doritos, but neither, deep down, can be trusted to make a proper cappuccino.


2. Morani or Torani Syrups

Just, no. This relates to item one, and you can employ the following corollary "The more things made in house the better the drinks will be."


3. A self-help bar with things to doctor your drink with.

This seems like it would be a positive. It isn't. You're paying five dollars for a 40 cent drink! You shouldn't have to assemble it yourself.

And three things that tell you a coffee shop might indeed be great

1. Their milk is organic and comes from out of a glass jug.

This is an easy way to see if they're serious about ingredients.


2. Pretty croissants for sale (or other serious looking pastry)

If you can't see their milk this is your next best indicator. You can have one if you want.


3. Focused baristas

When you watch them make a drink they should look like they're crafting something.




That should be enough to get you going. Now get out there and have yourself an absurdly expensive beverage. They make some nice eight dollar ones at Kopplins, where any syrups are their own, and the wee selection of pastry gleams and crackles.

Florence and Messi

Although my wife and I aren't leaving on our trip to Florence for ten months I have begun to peruse the guide books. And I have been immediately drawn to how many of these guidebooks try to helpfully rank the sights for me, usually working on a three-star system:


Three Stars: Don't miss!

Two Stars: Worth a visit if you can.

One Star: Go if convenient or of particular interest to you.


Now when I say I have been "drawn" to these rating systems, I mostly mean that they attract me towards them only to leave me in frothing rage at their blithe lack of nuance, cookie cutter opinions, and sheer lack of understanding.

Soon, no doubt in this very space, I will tell you how I would rank the cultural sights of cities, and how something like The Doria Pamphilij or San Luigi dei Francesi, both in Rome, could be better bets than The Colosseum or The Vatican Museum.

But not today.

Today I am too irritated at an aspect of all of this, an aspect I will call Local Relativism.

Here, take the best tourism sight in your city. If you live outside of North America you can't play. I'm terribly sorry. If you're in New York we can try, but it might not work. But you all can follow along and feel superior. Has everyone else chosen? Good. 

I chose The Minneapolis Institute of the Arts, wait, no, The Mall of America. The Mississippi River? Oh, oh, Minnehaha Falls!, no, no, go back to the Mall, no, Foshay Tower or the Spoon and Cherry or... 

Scratch that. I have no idea what to choose. I don't know, I couldn't decide. 

But I'm relieved you so confidently chose yours!

Let's say you live in New Orleans and you chose, random example, St. Louis Cemetery No. 1. That's your three star sight. Your benchmark. And I vaguely remember it as a fascinating place from a long ago trip, although I may be remembering a different cemetery.

But now let's put that three star sight in Rome.

No longer is it number one on the list. It is, and no offense is meant by this, now the 11,243rd best sight in the city. Which is not bad, really. But do you think all the 11,242 sights above it have three stars?

No, they don't. The fancy review guidebooks will have given maybe eight places in Rome three stars. This leaves 11,235 places, all more highly regarded than St. Louis Cemetery No. 1, having not gotten three stars. 

The reason they only have eight three-star places in Rome is because they are comparing Rome to Rome. It is like taking 84 different people who are all 7 feet 3 inches tall and deciding who is tallest. Then saying only four of them are really really tall.

Four 7'3" tall people are really really tall

Five 7'3" tall people are pretty dang tall

And five 7'3" tall people are kind of really tall 

All of the others are merely listed, albeit acknowledged as "Tall".



At this point, the very point where you might just be beginning to see what I mean, you might also be wondering what has me so upset.

Two things:

I don't like the way the guidebooks keep giving The Medici Chapel, in Florence, one or two stars. We are planning on staying across the street from The Medici Chapel and I am taking it personally! That's our Medici Chapel! Those are Michelangelos in there! If we had one knee of one of those sculptures in my Twin Cities we would be known as The Michelangelo's Knee cities. 

But it's Florence, so, whatever, one star.

But the second issue is even more important, but is, oddly, not travel or city related. 

Messi was recently chosen as the 5th best soccer player of the year. 

In case I haven't found a way to lecture on this to you Messi is inarguably the greatest soccer player who ever lived. But he's been doing it for awhile now and people have gotten a little tired of it. "Eh, he'll have other years." They say. And so they choose The St Louis Cemetery No. 1 as the best soccer player in the world for a year. Because each year of Messi soccer is 7'3" tall or like one of the best sights in Rome or Florence; there are just so many!

People like to talk about things like this as subjective. Maybe that's fine. But the moment you pick favorites, have a contest, or try to helpfully award stars, objective gets to enter into it. And once it does

1. Messi is better than everyone else at soccer. It's weird but actually objectively true. You can still watch this in real time.

2. Rome is a very nice city to visit if you do it properly. I am suspecting the same for Florence but I have lost faith in the guidebooks who tell me so.

3. If you try to compare Michelangelo's knees unfavorably, even slightly so, to anything else in art or a city, you're just going to look silly.

I'll admit I'm a little worked up about this, so it might not make total sense, but you'll have trust me on it. I can't fix it. I'm afraid I've injured my fingers from typing too hard.

How to taste gelato in Rome

I love gelato, and last year when I went to Rome for a month I decided to do a thorough survey of the gelaterias of Rome. Some of my fanaticism conflicted with having a good time with my wife, and I wisely defaulted to having a good time as much as I could. Nevertheless I was able to test out something close to 30 gelaterias in Rome and come up (just barely) with an overall best:

Come Il Latte

And a favorite flavor:

Lavender, at La Strega Nocciola.

I learned a lot about gelato, gelaterias, and gelato tasting. In prepation for tomorrows huge, giant, thrilling reveal of the new, from my latest trip, greatest gelateria in Rome (Spoiler alert; close your eyes if you don't want to know yet: it's Fatamorgana) I wanted to share some of the useful things I've learned.

Oh, and the spoiler alert is over so you can open your eyes again.



1. Flavor combinations are dangerous.

Yes, it's a thing to have three or four flavors in a cup, but they tend to easily muck each other up. Two complimentary, but distinct flavors are far safer and more likely to be enjoyable. One might be ideal, but a foil is useful and, see item four.


2. Popularity is not a reliable indicator of quality.

Most of the gelaterias of the central city are pretty busy on a warm afternoon, and massive crowds queuing at Giolitti have more to do with fame, herd mentality, and location than mastery.


3. Chocolate flavors make for poor test cases.

I'm not saying don't get all chocolate flavors all the time if that's what you love, but chocolate is too easy and too constant a flavoring to tell the story if you want to be an unpaid semi-professional reviewer like me. Some say Fior di Latte is the way to go as what it comes down to is unflavored gelato, but that goes too far the other way to me in its subtle plainness, and, for comparisons sake, it isn't offered everywhere.


4. One or two (or even three or four) flavors might not tell the tale.

Really good gelato is tricky stuff, based as it is on real ingredients. This is because real ingredients vary. Some strawberries, or avocados, or pistachios, are fantastic, some are simply okay and all this comes through in really good gelato. The ideal gelateria would only work with fantastic organic ingredients sampled constantly and would manage to have maybe six or seven flavors a day at best instead of the more usual 20 or 30. And a gelato there would probably cost 7 or 8 euros. But I haven't seen this sort of approach anywhere yet. 

If the gelato is mediocre or poor somewhere the gelateria should probably be dismissed. And if it's amazing you should see what else they can do. But if it's simply really good you'd probably need to work through eight or nine flavors to have a good picture of the place. But that's a rule few to none of us are intrepid enough to follow.


5. Weird is good!

If someone can pull off pear/gorgonzola gelato then they seriously know what they're doing. But you're taking your life into your own hands here.


6. Don't get distracted. Okay, get distracted.

Try not to get too caught up on your counter experience. They may be mean, or unfriendly, or charming and wonderful, but it will all be over quickly and the cool gelato will be in your hot little hands and the judging should begin there. You don't have to go back. On the other hand if all the gorgeous buildings and visions of Rome distract you and dazzle your heart and make your gelato seem better than it is, well, let it. Your gelato has earned that one.

Top ten super hidden gems of Rome

1. Ponte Rotto

It's a bridge, just off the south tip of Isola Tiberina, you know, in the river. You can't walk on it because it's broken. That flood in 1598 was such a drag! By the time Turner drew it it still had three arches, but after 2,100 years now, we're down to this one arch. So, like, hurry!


2. La Strega Nocciola

It's a gelateria in the Spanish Steps area. But I don't mean the whole gelateria, just the metal bin that contains the lavender flavor.


3. Brick number 27 near Via Monterone 26 (count 27 bricks from the wall vent)

It's just a really special brick, but I'll admit it looks a lot like all the other bricks.


4. The Pinturicchio Frescoes in the Basilica of Santa Maria del Popolo

There are 487 better paintings in Rome. There are better paintings than these right in the same church! But, oh these are lovely. So so so lovely. I love them. So just for the hell of it ignore other completely bewildering and mind-blowing Caravaggios nearby, and head over here like you're a Pinturicchio scholar, which, compared to everyone else there, you already practically are!


5. The couch at the window of the cafe I've sworn not to tell anyone about.

Sorry. But you have to admit that's pretty super hidden. And yes, it's good, so good I've been sworn not to tell anyone.


6. Piazza Borghese

Sure, it's a comparatively unremarkable, but also perfectly nice and central, Roman Piazza. It also hosts a little prints and booksellers market regularly where we have sometimes bought vintage postcards. But of course the amazing thing is that this, yes, this is the very spot where the beloved classic movie When in Rome, starring Kristen Bell and Josh Duhamel, was filmed! Partly. With a fake fountain. And when I say "Classic" I mean it got a 25 percent score on metacritic and was critically reviled.

But that doesn't mean it wasn't totally charming. And this is where it happened!


7. Feral art exhibit along the fence in front of the Augustus Mausoleum.

Is it still there? At the fence? On the wall? It's worth taking a chance. It's like a 3D cartoon of the Rome tourist experience.


8. Chiesa di San Rocco

You go in and to the left there is a nave decorated to look like a stone grotto. I just like it. And it's hidden. And it's my list. I don't expect you to like everything here, and besides, you'll be so high from seeing where they filmed the Kristen Bell fountain scenes that you'll barely notice the disappointment.


9. The Palazzo Barberini Cafe

I'll save you the trouble of your exhaustive Internet search and a lot of awkward questions with the Barberini Museum Staff. There is no cafe. I refer to the highly entertaining coin-op espresso machine in a vestibule (a large vestibule) at the Bernini Stairs.


10. I lost it!

This was the best one too! But it is so hidden that I misplaced it. I'm pretty sure it is somewhere sort of near the Vicolo del Divino Amore. Just spend a few fruitless hours poking about near there and it'll probably turn it up. Trust me.

Top ten super hidden gems of Rome, an introduction

My wife and I will soon be going to Rome. This will be our fourth trip. The last trip was only a year and a half ago, and it was for a month, so I'm pretty well acquainted with all the main sights of the city. And as an inveterate researcher and travel blogger I can tell you it doesn't add much to the discussion to say:

"You're going to Rome? You might want to check out the Pantheon."

You've got to dig deeper!

I have dug deeper!

I am going to tell you about the secret, hidden, off-the-beaten-path, little known treasures of Rome.

Now a neophyte traveler might wonder "Rome has over 200 epic, world class, live-up-to-the-hype tourist sights. Why would I need to seek out the obscure ones?"

Thank you for your question neophyte! You will find that even if you go to Rome for a month, and you tramp in and out of every famous place you possibly can, the only question anyone will ever ask when you return is if you went to the one place you didn't go. 

Like "Did you go to the Colosseum?"

There are, technically, three answers to this question:

1. Yes! (But, if this is your answer they won't be asking this question. They will instead be asking about some other place you couldn't get to because you got caught up in the lines at the Colosseum for longer than you expected).

2. No. (Mumbled ashamedly, like you somehow failed your $8,000 vacation to Italy).

or...

3. Pfft. The Colosseum is for amateurs! You do realize it's broken don't you? And that anyone can go and they all do? No, I spent that time poking around illegally in the Mausoleum of Augustus. I brought back what I think is part of his femur. (At which point just keep talking because if you take a single breath they will change the subject since people only pretend to want to hear all about your vacation). 


But it's not just about your superiority and being a more awesome traveler than everyone else, which, as you might gather from the above passage, no one but you will care about anyway, and probably not you very much either when it comes right down to it.

It's about fun. Enjoyment. Satisfaction.

I can't fault your desire to see the Sistine Ceiling, Piazza Navona, the Pantheon, or the Colosseum (though you do realize that the Colosseum is broken and looted, don't you?). Depending on your taste one of these gloried sights might be the greatest experience of your entire 11 hours in Rome. But it also helps to have something a little personal too, something not in the guidebooks, with no pictures on the Internet, that is all yours. Something that is almost like a magical accident, which is the best part of travel, just with the slightest help on your way over to it. 

Which is what I will offer here tomorrow. But first you probably need to gather yourself, and go get a pen and paper for notes. But you're definitely going to want to tune in tomorrow for my top ten list of super hidden gems of Rome. So you might want to save this page for future reference traveler. I have found the best way to do that is to put a piece of tracing paper over this screen and copy everything in colored pencils.

But if there's a new-fangled technique you prefer don't let me stand in the way.

The only survey that matters

We here in Heaven have noticed a lot of you taking the lord's name in vain lately, and instead of going around smiting and sending people to hell like we usually do in response to this, we decided to take a look at the problem. That is why we have commissioned this survey: 

How's God Doing?

Please answer as honestly as you can. One lucky respondant will be randomly chosen for Beatification.



1. I feel that God is

     A. Doing a great job and it's clearly everyone elses' fault.
     B. Beyond the scope of my judgement, but I'm concerned he's getting a little portly.
     C. Really wanting to do the right thing, deep down.
     D. Probably going to come back from this super long vacation deeply refreshed!


2. My favorite thing God does is

     A. Is there, like, a list of things he does, or one you could mention, maybe?
     B. Answer my prayers real sneaky like so it looks like they're not being answered at all.
     C. Maketh sporting figures to winnith sports games.
     D. Embarass the Atheists with all his awesome existing!


3. If there is one thing I'd like God to do better it would be

     A. I don't think virtue should be its own reward. I think it should also get coupons.
     B. Road conditions in spring in the upper midwest.
     C. Well, I don't know if this is doing "better", but could God maybe retroactively delay the Beatles break-up to 1970 or so?
     D. More appearances on "Chat" shows.


4. I would become more religious if

     A. Other people weren't involved.
     B. Someone else did it first.
     C. I weren't 24/7 maxed out on religious all the time already. Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!
     D. I weren't so goddamned busy with your stupid surveys! Don't call here again! Do you understand? Take me off your call list! I am unfriending you and blocking you and reporting you.


5. I am

     A. A Christian naturally.
     B. A really embarassed (former) Atheist.
     C. Getting kind of thirsty.
     D. Wondering about your interesting font.




Thank you so much for taking the time to answer. Tune in here soon when we report the Lord God's 2018 approval ratings.

Should you read clerkmanifesto?

You have seen the clerkmanifesto drip feeding out onto the Internet. And ever starved for something decent to read on the vast paucity that is the Internet you wondered "Is clerkmanifesto for me?"

How can you know?

Perhaps, you think, you could read a random sampling from my easily available 1,800 extant blog posts and... just... see.

No.

No no no no no! That won't do at all!

There is only one reliable way to find out if clerkmanifesto is for you; take my quiz!

Is Clerkmanifesto Right for You?

1. A public library is

     A. A place where librarians are shamefully coddled.
     B. A good place to get free squirts of hand sanitizer.
     C. A little something for the less fortunate among us.
     D. The place to go to get on a long waiting list for A Gentleman From Moscow, which was published two years ago.
     E. Something I sure would like to read a blog about!


2. Politically I am

     A. To the left.
     B. To the left of the left.
     C. Further left than "B", whose rampant centrism disgusts me.
     D. Considerably to the left of "C", who might as well be fascist as far as I'm concerned.
     E. Aware that there are more than two answers to this question. There are five.


3. Nature is

     A. The step just before real estate.
     B. A trick.
     C. Either showing off or laying low. There is no inbetween.
     D. Am I at the right test? I'm supposed to get $20 to try a new "Wheat Thin".
     E. Something I would like to read more about provided it was written by a responsible Midwestern Blogger who has a special understanding with turkeys.


4. I particularly enjoy reading blog posts written by

     A. Geniuses!
     B. People who think they're geniuses and are none too shy to say so.
     C. People who joke about being geniuses but really think they are but are so ridiculous about it it can get a little hard to tell for sure.
     D. Geniuses who are so multi-layered, absurd, obsessive, and satirical about their genius that they have tricked you into thinking they are not geniuses when they totally are.
     E. People who give you a way out in the end where you don't have to get your hands dirty.

How to Score

1. If you answered any of the questions.

Yes, clerkmanifesto is right for you! We will send you out a chaperone for your first year.



2. If you read all the questions and answers without skimming, thinking carefully and deeply about each one, then re-reading to be sure.

You are too good for this world. We will pray for you every night and will see to it that the Wheat Thins people send you your 20 dollars.


3. You skipped the preamble and quit the test at the first question.

Keep practicing! 

The response

Recently in my town we had a protracted *sort of* hostage stand-off. The most exciting part seemed to involve some tear gas and a guy throwing a microwave out of a hotel window. But mostly it all just involved a lot of waiting around and eventually a final apprehension in which nobody was hurt.

The strange, slow motion, let's-close-the-city-but-there's-no-danger response to this incident brought to the fore how an incident like this is handled differently based on the identity of the perpetrator. And so to assist you in identifying what might actually be going on in any future hostage stand-off you may encounter in the news I have prepared the following guide:

Your Guide to Poorly Covered Hostage Crises

 

If the hostage taker is: Black and poor

City/Government responders will be: City police, lots of them, heavily armed

In which: They immediately storm the building

This is covered by: The local TV news

The operation will result in: A dead guy.

And the final result will be: It turned out it wasn't actually a hostage situation, the guy was just confused and likely harmless, there are city protests, and the Grand Jury decides not to indict any police officers.



If the hostage taker is: A group of alt-right fanatics

City/Government responders will be: FBI

In which: A section of the city will be closed down for months while painfully cautious and careful negotiations carry on.

This is covered by: Full National Media saturation coverage even though nothing ever happens.

The operation will result in: Right-wingers being easily apprehended while making a desperate break for snack foods, however one guy accidentally shoots himself in the leg.

And the final result will be: Everyone found guilty and then everyone released a month later on technicalities.




If the hostage taker is: A group of left-wing protesters

City/Government responders will be: Police, CIA, FBI, National Guard.

In which: After a one-day stand-off a raid is triggered by an on edge National Guard member firing on the Police.

This is covered by: Full National Media saturation coverage, most of it inaccurate and only corrected in unpopular books written four years after the fact.

The operation will result in: The apprehension of protesters and one dead responder killed by friendly fire.

And the final result will be: A wide variety of prison sentences, little understanding that none of the protesters were armed, and a general angry sense of the protesters being responsible for the dead National Guardsman shot by a startled FBI agent.




If the hostage taker is: A White-collar fugitive.

City/Government responders will be: Local Police.

In which: There's just sort of a stand-off until the guy gives himself up.

This is covered by: Local media who somehow never manage to provide any solid information until days after the incident is finished and no one cares anymore.

The operation will result in: Who cares.

And the final result will be: I don't know. Probably some kind of trial or something.

Tipping

In preparation for our trip to Paris my wife and I read up on tipping. Luckily this is simple because by law a service charge is already covered, built into the bill in both Paris and all of France. Whew! So it's straightforward, we do not tip at all. Great.

Ha. Not so fast bucko. They always start out telling you how simple it is and then the gobbledygook begins. This is some of what I have learned:


You only have to tip for great service, and there is no great service in Paris, but the waiters are really good at their jobs and work really hard so you should notice just how great their service is. Nevertheless you don't need to feel guilty for not tipping because waiters in Paris are very well compensated, like people here who work in shops or Bakeries. So don't tip anything, nothing at all, just leave the change, or a few euros.

It's okay to tip a little if you want though. For instance, it is customary to round up so that, say, on a bill of 17.80, you leave an extra euro. At a nicer expensive restaurant leave five percent, but if it's really fancy leave ten percent because you're just burning through money anyway at this point, so why not share? Give the waiter your $4,000 watch while you're at it you bloated glutton!

If you're not sure what to tip in a given situation watch what the Parisians do. Look for a table of beret wearing French speakers, and wait patiently for them to finish their three hour meal. Then ask if you can poke around in their little payment dish.


It's all very confusing and strange. But I think I have it all down, and I'm not inclined to complain. In brief: 

Tipping in France is just like it is here in America, but using less money.