Online narcissism

I know Matt is a big fan of GoodReads, but I have to say it’s pretty dorky to get these updates telling me about all the wonderful literary explorations of friends and colleagues.

It’s the same kind of dorkiness college Freshman demonstrate when they open their doors and blast the latest tunes to demonstrate their wonderful musical taste to the cutie down the hall.

I mean, I would never just broadcast that I had finished Christopher Hitchens’ God is Not Great, while also tackling David Foster Wallace’s collection of essays, Consider the Lobster, just shortly after polishing off Deathly Hallows, while slipping through Allan Kahane’s beachable (yet thought-provoking) Fire with Fire.

I would never do that. I’ve just been too busy laughing at John McPhee’s succulently reminiscent tale in the latest New Yorker, and brooding over Fred Thompson’s chops in the New York magazine review by Stephen Rodrick.

Hypocrite of the day: Carole Migden

So, at first I thought it was going to be a slow news day for the blog. After last nights rant on Citysearch, I was a bit warn out from ranting and there was nothing particularly topical that I wanted to write about today. Then I came across this tidbit that writes itself, so here we go:

Carole Migden is a Democratic State Senator from San Francisco. Apparently, well, at least according to her Wikipedia entry, she is familiar with scandal so this latest tidbits, puts her back into familiar territory. After having pushed for a ban of driving and using your cell phone at the same time (which passed)**, this past weekend she rear ended another vehicle. Now none of that is exactly hypocritical, in fact it seems almost those two statements have nothing to do with each other until you find out- wait for it- You got it, she was distracted by her cell phone which caused her to rear-end the other vehicle.

The exact details are a bit sketchy, but it seems like she was reaching for her ringing cell-phone, according to a statement her office released.

Let’s see how her office spins this one (after being the ones who released a statement that she was going for the phone).

Here is the San Francisco Chronicles coverage

**ok, so yes, all the blogs are reporting that she pushed for the whole cell phone ban thing. Well, maybe she just voted for it, if that is the case she gets a downgrade to Hypocrite of the Hour, but still, practice what you preach