Didactic Synapse

As you may know, I’m editing a collection of short stories to publish my first book this summer, entitled This Ain’t What You Rung For. Included toward the end is a smattering of the very short pieces I scribble during Journal Writing time in my Creative Writing class. Here is but one selection from that treasure trove. Watch for the book later in 2013 to explore a whole lot more!

There’s this guy, and he’s flappin’ his arms, and he goes: “Yes! terday I was flappin’ my dog’s arms!”

“What are you talking about?” asked the judge. The entire courtroom was peering at the guy with inflamed curiosity.

“You know,” he said, “my dog’s arms. He goes dancin’ the la bambaaa..” As he began to sing, the guy rose to his feet and sashayed around the courtroom. His lawyer sank her head into her hands.

The judge banged his gavel. “Mister President,” he said. “This is highly unorthodox.”

But the president couldn’t hear the judge. He was lost in his own tiny little world, a world of wood sprites and gumdrop munchkins, where ducks shoot grapes at hammers and all the world’s a big bathtub filled with tofu-based snack treats.

“Bailiff,” the judge said, “please escort the witness back to the stand.” But it was too late. The president was dancing right out the doors of the courtroom and disappeared into the hallway. The judge was about to declare a mistrial, when the doors suddenly slammed open once again, and there stood the president — with Marie Antoinette beside him!

All the spectators gasped in astonishment, then exploded with spontaneous applause. It was a great day for America. Marie Antoinette was a caveman.

THE END

It’s only been, what? Four years since the last episode? I hope it was worth the wait!

DS #84: Pegatron and the Cult of Money

Top Links + Action

• Apartheid Regime Bomb Victim Father Michael Lapsley on Using Forgiveness to Heal From Tragedy
• Wal-Mart and The Gap refuse to sign worker protection agreement
• Simpsons food court at Universal Studios
• Take Action: Stop US government spying!

Current Events

• 200 killed in Bangladesh factory building collapse
• Different places have different safety rules and that’s okay
• Bangladesh collapsed factory owner arrested
• Blaze at locked Chinese poultry slaughterhouse kills 119
• Texas fertilizer company didn’t heed disclosure rules before blast
• Fracking drives potentially explosive demand for potentially explosive ammonia factories
• Q&A with Josh Fox: Gasland II
• Woman in Kuwait gets 11 years for “insulting” tweet
• News archive, 1994: MADD co-founder goes to work for liquor lobby

Economics

• How austerity kills
• “How austerity kills” co-author Stuckler on DemocracyNow
• Apple shifts production from Foxconn to Pegatron
• Pope: “cult of money”
• How many HFT firms actually use Twitter to trade?
• Twitter hack was the work of the Syrian Electronic Army
• How the robots lost: HFT’s rise and fall
• Are American taxpayers subsidizing Wal-Mart’s low wages?
• “The Low-Wage Drag on Our Economy: Wal-Mart’s low wages and their effect on taxpayers and economic growth” (pdf)
• Why ending extreme poverty is not enough

Education

• There are no D or F schools in Wisconsin
• “Pay for performance” pitfalls
• Common Core: Cutting edge or dull blade?
• Tea Party groups rallying against Common Core
• Be glad for our failure to catch China’s schools
• French teacher shows pupils horror movie “Saw”
• Why French kids don’t have ADHD

Killer Robots, Etc

• Summary of Obama speech on drones
• The Drone War: A comprehensive map of lethal US attacks
• Medea Benjamin on why she disrupted Obama’s speech
• UN report wants moratorium on killer robots
• Teaching robots to anticipate human actions
• Modelling scouts target anorexia patients
• The Tumblr bucket: Yahoo needs to make cash off it
• Reading literature makes us smarter and nicer
• “Urgent need” to remove space debris

Hip-Hop

Sir Mix-A-Lot: Swass

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkaJoMicA04

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NR7mRC85C3c