Running up the score

Running up the score

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News Headline: “Neurologist describes football brain hazards.”
News Headline: “Football-related head injuries rising.”
Football is the sport that requires its spectators to look in the other direction.



News Headline: “Romney ‘still deciding’ on immigration.”
That may explain it.
He hasn’t been changing positions all this time.
He’s just been thinking out loud.



The Case for Zero Tolerance of Modern School Administrators:
Campbell County High School in Gillette, Wyo., has named 13 valedictorians.
And 25 salutatorians.



News Headline: “Government spying on Americans increases under Obama–despite campaign promises.”
There are several variations of President Obama’s Politics of Hope.
One is to walk quietly away and hope no one will notice.


News Headline: “Still no prosecutions on Wall Street.”
News Headline: “Bank of America to get new slogan.”
News Headline: “What slogan would you give Bank of America?”
Not an easy one.
QT is still deciding between “Who? Us?” and “Candy from a Baby.”
There may be others… .



News Headline: “Chicago bracing for NATO.”
And who hasn’t found this great city invigorating?


News Headline: “Texas put an innocent man to death, Columbia University investigation finds.”
The top five nations for executions are China, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan and the United States, if you are interested in the kind of company we keep.


Tim Contreras, a San Antonio, Texas, reader, regarding QT’s not liking the word “blog,” not considering itself a blog and wondering what it should call itself, writes:
“QT is not a simple weblog, a blog. QT is known for showing curiosity, which makes it a curiosity weblog. It is a clog.
And when QT has an off day, we can think of it as a slog.


News Item: Police break up a brawl at a wedding reception in Danvers, Mass., arresting the groom’s mother after she attacked the bride’s mother as the groom punched the bride’s brother and tore apart the coat room.
It is the little things that go wrong at weddings that often provide our most treasured memories.



News Headline: “Henry Kissinger gets TSA pat-down.”
How can we allow our nation’s highest leadership to be subjected to this kind of indignity?
And when can it be managed again?



News Item: ”… the evolution of American business into a true service economy…”
QT remembers when bottles of milk waited at the doorstep, when dry cleaning was picked up and delivered, when a driver sat in a car while someone pumped the gas, checked the oil and cleaned the windshield.
But that was before we became a service economy.


News Headline: “Feral ducks plague South Florida town.”
News Headline: “Killer bees now rule Florida’s hives.”
News Headline: “Savage termites are the latest species to plague Florida, joining pythons, giant rats, crocodiles and poisonous caterpillars.”
Add to that about 800,000 Floridians with concealed-carry permits, and you have a summer traveler’s paradise.

News Headline: “Man armed with potato steals ambulance.”
There is probably an interesting story behind that.



Notice  received by QT during a Google search:
“Our systems have detected unusual traffic from your computer network. This page checks to see if it’s really you sending the requests, and not a robot.”
A robot?
Should QT be insulted?
Then again, as the note was sent by a computer, maybe it was a compliment.


News Item: “Apple tax avoidance: Evil scheming, good business or both?”
These days, both.



From the QT Archive of Knowledge:
+  The national debt as percent of GDP is lower today than it was in 1946.
+  Koalas leave fingerprints.



Today’s Birthdays: Spam, 121;  SpaghettiOs, 47.


QT Grammar R Us Seminar on the English Language
+  K. Weiszhaar, a Denver reader, writes:
“If you buy a roasted chicken in a plastic bag at the local Kroger, it says on the bag:  ‘Bag Not Ovenable.’  Ovenable?  To Oven?”
You should try the chicken with that stuffing that’s stovetopable.
+  M.B., a Chicago reader, regarding QT’s mention that creme de menthe is pronounced krem-de-MAHNT, wants you to know that if you sip a creme de cacao, you are not sipping kreem-de-KOH-koh, but krem-de-kah-KAH-oh.
And “liqueur” is not pronounced lih-KYOOR, but lih-KUR.
And, hey, as long as we are on the subject of mistakes, “err” does not rhyme with “air.”
It rhymes with “fur.”


QT appears Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.
It can be reached at  qt@wbez.org