ES3 & News of the Day

If anyone out there teaches English or knows anyone who does, please consider looking at my book on English sentence structure, or passing it on to that English-teaching friend. It’s a system that visually shows how our sentences are constructed, how we can all become better, clearer writers, how we can analyze what good writing is all about and then learn to imitate it. And, for the most part, it avoids that old grammarian trap—the obfuscating terminology of traditional grammar. I’d hate to see this system die along with me. Please, anyone, check it out. Use it. Teach it. And you can get a copy for only $2.99 at Lulu.com. Just click on this link and it will take you to Lulu. ES3

I saw in the paper today that Sarah Palin is considering a run at the Republican nomination for president. Whoa! Hillary must be doing a dance at that news.

And if that doesn’t make her happy, she must be ecstatic hearing that Donald Trump may also toss his hat in the ring. What an odd couple that could be: a Palin/Trump or a Trump/Palin ticket. After Palin’s strange (“bizarro, incoherent, rambling,” according to most Tweets about it) rant in Iowa on Saturday, the Democratic National Committee sent her a thank you note.

The same-sex marriage ban in Alabama has been overturned by the courts, and it will soon be overturned in the rest of those states which still ban such unions. Remarkable how far we’ve come in the past decade in the attitudes of most people toward homosexuality. Remarkable how far we still have to go.

So You Think You Can Dance will be returning soon. But without Mary Murphy.

And with a new judging format that separates the dancers into two categories: street dance and classical dance. We’ll really miss Mary Murphy’s humor and her “Hot Tamale Train.” The new judges, Paula Abdul and Jason Derulo, can’t possibly take her place. And part of the fun of the show has always been seeing how some of the street dancers were able to become great dancers in the other styles and how some classically trained dancers picked up on the street moves. I’m not sure I’m going to like this new SYTYCD.

Only one comment to make about deflate-gate: a tempest in a teapot.

What a silly thing to make an issue the week before the Super Bowl. Another silly Super Bowl detail: that the average cost of a ticket to SB XLIX is $3950. Man, that’s a lot of money just so you can say you were there. Let’s see, it seats 63,400. Multiply by 4,000 = $253,600,000. Yep, that’s right, just over a quarter of a billion bucks taken in for one silly football game.

Pope Francis on his way back to Rome from the Philippines said, “Some think, excuse me if I use the word, that in order to be good Catholics, we have to be like rabbits.” He wasn’t suggesting that Catholics should be using contraceptives; he meant that all Catholics should show some responsibility about having over-large families. And the fight goes on. According to Catholic teachings, the “rhythm method” or abstinence are the only two acceptable ways to control birth. And the rhythm method has been shown to be almost totally unreliable, and abstinence is simply silly. Come on, boys and girls, we’re living in the 21st Century, and we’re up to almost seven billion people. That’s enough. In fact, that’s about four billion too many.