Weekend Wonk
Of Escalades and Steak Knives
Jerome Shea May 5, 2007
If they are not worming through your phone line, they are lying in wait in your mailbox: folks who want to reward you magnificently just for coming to their solar energy seminar or tromping about their chunk of mountain or mesa. It’s the reward that tickles me, and by now it’s familiar to most of …
Respectable Laughter Only
Dan Shea April 28, 2007
FROM: ME TO: ANYONE WITH AN EMAIL ADDRESS SUBJECT: FWD: ADVICE ON INTERNET HUMOR – (DO NOT FORWARD!!!) > > > Slaving away at a keyboard all week got you down? Do you start to loathe the feel of a mouse in your hand before lunchtime? Do you have trouble reading the prices at Starbucks …
The I-Man Goeth
Jerome Shea April 21, 2007
(Can you stand one more column about Don Imus, Gentle Reader? That’s what I thought. Well, since you are staring at the monitor anyway you can do some surfing, play Tetris, whatever, while I indulge myself. You won’t hurt my feelings.) Don Imus, talk show shock jock, deserved to be fired. Let’s get …
Healthcare in America: Get It or Die!
Dan Shea April 14, 2007
It’s no secret that in this country of wealth and global power we are facing an internal crisis. The crisis I speak of is not poverty, it is not adult illiteracy, it isn’t even that horrible grinding noise I hear when I’m too drunk to work the clutch. No, the crisis I speak of …
Running a Requiem, Singing a Marathon
Jerome Shea April 7, 2007
I am runner and a singer. More specifically, I run marathons and I sing (bass) with the University of New Mexico Chorus. I ran my first marathon—the Duke City, here in Albuquerque—in 1986, I joined the chorus a couple of years later, and here I am in 2007 still running and still singing. Early on I …
Breaking the Law... or Broken Laws?
Jerome Shea March 31, 2007
News item (The Week, 23 March) Twenty-one years ago, Juan Matamoros was ticketed for public urination in Massachusetts. Now 49 and living in Florida, Matamoros is being forced to move with his family, because a new law bans “sex offenders” from living within 2,500 feet of a child-care facility. …
Great Moments in Teaching II
Jerome Shea March 24, 2007
Last week I made fun of poor Harold Welsh and his colon problem (or perhaps his problem colon). This week is my turn; it’s only fair. So, two stories at Shea’s expense. I taught my first class, a freshman composition class, in the fall of 1964 at Colorado State University in Ft. Collins. I was …
Great Moments in Teaching
Jerome Shea March 17, 2007
The other day I was teaching my sophomore writing class the finer points of colon usage, so naturally I thought of Harold Welsh. But before I get to that, I should add that my students—unless they are too polite—never seem to notice the similarity, indeed the identity, of the colon as a mark of …
Jemez Half
Jerome Shea March 10, 2007
I found that other essay, Dear Readers, and I count on your indulgence in letting me run it, for surely you do not want to leave me in ignominy at the hands—or rather the feet—of Ed Green, my nemesis from Devil’s Throne. -Shea The Jemez Pueblo Half-Marathon is one of the prettiest footraces in the …
Devil’s Throne
Jerome Shea March 3, 2007
Dear Readers, An oldie for you this weekend. But I hope you’ll also take it as a goodie. Enjoy. - Shea The thing about Devil’s Throne is, you can’t keep hold of the truth, from one year to the next, of just how tough it is. Oh, you always have a good picture of that absurd hill in your mind and you …