Fluff

I notice that you use plain, simple language, short words and brief sentences. That is the way to write English. Stick to it; don't let fluff and flowers and verbosity creep in.

— Mark Twain

Verbose writing is frilly, flowery, frivolous and fluff-brained. A thing, at all costs, to avoid.

But some fluff is tasty.

Take, for example, the kind used to make a Fluffernutter.

The Fluffernutter was invented in by one Emma Curtis, who with her brother began making and marketing Snowflake Marshmallow Crème in 1913 in their home-state of Massachusetts.

The great-great-great-granddaughter of Paul Revere, Emma knew to keep watch on her competitors, of which there were scores.

To outdo them, she published brochures packed with recipes for marshmallow-crème treats, and advertised the brochures in newspapers and on radio. 

One, published in the middle of World War I, contained Emma's short recipe for the Liberty, a marshmallow crème and peanut butter sandwich.

The Liberty became her all-time hit.

But, sadly, Emma was not to reap all its rewards.

A local competitor, Durkee-Mower, trumped Emma, not by running ads, but by sponsoring an entire radio show. 

Named The Flufferettes, it aired in the half-hour spot before The Jack Benny Show and featured comedy, music, and recipes—including the recipe for the Liberty.

In 1960, Durkee-Mower's ad agency renamed Emma's sandwich The Fluffernutter, and rest, as we say, is history.

A Catholic Conundrum Cleared Up At Last

Faith may be defined as an illogical belief in
the occurrence of the improbable.

— H. L. Mencken

As Whole Woman's Health v. Austin Jackson proves, right-wing Catholics on the Supreme Court are a clear and present danger—to women. 

By recriminalizing abortion, they will increase women's misery beyond calculation.

Believe what you will about fetuses; that's your right.

But recognize the Roman Catholic Church, following Aristotle, for nearly two millennia held that a fetus had no soul until it was six months old—and therefore couldn't be murdered.

Early-stage abortions weren't sinful.  

Only a modern bit of dogmatic gymnastics changed the Church's position on abortion.

And the change came about ass-backwards.

Before 1854, Catholic canonists had struggled with a thorny riddle: how could Jesus have be born of a woman stained by Original Sin?

It's uncanny! 

To solve the riddle, Giovanni Mastai-Ferretti (Pope Pius IX) declared that Jesus' conception was "immaculate" because Mary was born without sin.

Problem solved!

But Mastai-Ferretti's solution also led him to declare all abortions a mortal sin.

Why? 

Because Mary's sin-free life began not at viability, but conception.

Logically speaking, it had to.

Or so said the infallible Mastai-Ferretti.

So we've arrived at the bottom line:

Because an Italian decided 150 years ago that a Jewish woman was born without sin 2,000 years ago, no 21st century Texan can have an abortion without exposing her accomplices to fines and criminal penalties.

Makes perfect sense to me.

Thanks Amy, Brett and Neil, for clearing that up!

We look forward to your future legal decisions.

NOTE: Just so you know, I single out Catholics and exclude Evangelicals from blame for recriminalizing abortion for a simple reason: no Evangelical is intelligent enough to receive a Supreme Court appointment.

UPDATE: Amy, Brett and Neil didn't dawdle. We learned in May 2022 that they plan to overturn Roe v. Wade.

Above: Judging Amy by Robert Francis James. Oil on canvas board. 10 x 8 inches. Not available in Texas. 

What Happened to Leaning In?

The ambition and focus that propel you to success
can also be your downfall. 

— Judy Smith

Schadenfreude is unhealthy, but I nonetheless relish watching the once high and mighty humbled.

This month's fallen angel is Elizabeth Holmes, wunderkind and Steve Jobs wannabe.

Once the the world's youngest female self-made billionaire, Holmes now stands trial for defrauding investors of $400 million and faces 20 years in prison if convicted.

In 2013—the same year she reached the top of the world by selling her company's fake blood tests to millions of unsuspecting consumers—Holmes' Silicon Valley neighbor Sheryl Sandberg popularized the phrase leaning in.

Facing a prison cell, it appears Holmes is no longer leaning in, but weaseling out.

While the Northern California DA alleges she committed fraud, Holmes is trying to walk between raindrops, claiming she was only following Silicon Valley's "playbook," and that an "emotionally abusive" boyfriend led her into temptation (he will also go on trial for fraud next year).

Hogwash.

Hey, Liz, now that you've been caught with your hand in the till, how about leaning into the truth a little?

Why dodge your actions and blame others—and why blame a boyfriend?

An op-ed in The New York Times insists Holmes is the innocent victim of the "male-dominated world of tech start-ups" and the "boys’ club that is the tech industry." No man would be put on trial for swindling investors.

More hogwash.

If you want to lean in, lean in. There's no in betweenin'.

UPDATE, NOVEMBER 30, 2021: Holmes testified yesterday that her boyfriend drove her to commit her crimes.

UPDATE, JANUARY 3, 2022: Holmes was found guilty of fraud. "The Svengali Defense didn’t work," said journalist John Carreyou.

Going to Pieces

We all could use a little mercy now.

I know we don't deserve it, but we need it anyhow.

— Mary Gauthier

No surprise here: a Gallup poll shows our esteem for Internet providers has tanked.

In the relentless pursuit of profits, these companies have turned a modern miracle into the vilest of cesspools.

Lies, vulgarity and stupidity are the rule, rather than the exception.

In a civil war of words, brothers fight brothers; sisters, sisters; husbands, wives. 

And everyone goes to pieces.

But there is a way to keep it together: do some good.

“I was once a fortunate man, but at some point fortune abandoned me," the Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius wrote. "But true good fortune is what you make for yourself. Good fortune: good character, good intentions, and good actions.”

Don't just stand there: do something good. Today. Tomorrow. The next day. And the next. 

If you expect the trolls to surrender, don't hold your breath. 

If you hope to fix stupid, fuggedaboutit.

Just refuse to be implicated in the lies and the ugliness and do some good.

As the proverb says, "Let not mercy and truth forsake you; bind them about your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart, and so find favor and good understanding in the sight of God and man."

Souvenirs

Maine photographer Peter Ralston treated my wife and me last week to a half-hour's exploration on foot of Widow's Island, a 15-acre island in Pensobscot Bay.

We took home with us old bricks as souvenirs.

They came from the ruins of an asylum that once operated on the island, torn down by the WPA in 1935, long after it had ceased to serve its original purpose.

The US Navy built the asylum in 1888 to quarantine sailors sickened with deadly yellow fever. The brisk seaside climate was thought to aide recovery.

But the building never housed a single ailing sailor, because naval surgeons found a new treatment for yellow fever—inducing diarrhea with purgatives like mercury, coal tar, castor oil, and caffeine—the following year.

The Widow's Island Naval Sanitorium was another $50,000 federal boondoggle. 

The Navy donated the empty asylum to Maine in 1904, which turned it into a summer retreat for lunatics interned in asylums in Augusta and Bangor. 

As part of the land transfer, the state renamed Widow's Island after a local judge, and the asylum became known as the Chase Island Convalescent Hospital.

But locals continued to call the place Widow's Island.

The lunatic asylum only operated for a decade, after which the building was used as a school for the children of lighthouse keepers, and again as a naval hospital during World War I.

When the WPA tore down the building, it intended to recycle the thousands of bricks, and piled them neatly on the island's shore. 

That was a mistake.

Light-fingered lobstermen stole the bricks to weight their traps, pave the walkways around their homes, and line their chimneys.

Fortunately, they left a few for souvenir-hunters like us.