Stickybuffalo.com

So, one of the 100-some categories which have been created in SB’s WordPress system is “Year in Review.” Apparently it’s been used before not once, but twice: two years ago both Charlie and Josh assigned a post to this category. Given that it’s there, then, and that fast away the old year passeth, I suppose I might as well do a 2010 Year in Review of sorts.

I think the lead item, at least in reflecting on 2010, has to be The Gulf Oil Spill by BP.

Be honest, now: it’s hard to even believe that was this year, isn’t it? It feels like it was all so long ago, though of course the consequences are still playing out and will probably continue to do so for years. But it’s long-gone from the public consciousness, in sharp contrast to the weeks (which seemed like months) during which it was a full-scale four-alarm national obsession.

And at this point it’s really hard to avoid wondering, at least quietly, if it might all have been a bit of an overreaction…? Personally I think that it was, and at the same time, was just the opposite. (more…)

Season of giving? Peace on Earth and goodwill toward men? “Unto you is born a savior?”

Good grief!

Oh well. I’m not going to let this kind of pious hippy claptrap ruin my Christmas of materialism, boozing, weirdness and surreality. Let’s look at what odd Christmas-related images have ended up on my Mac over the years. (more…)

Hey parents!

Yes, you. Do any of you have insight on the “Happy Meal: Threat or Menace” story? I’m not sure that any Buffalo Kids are old enough yet to start whining about going to McDonald’s for a Shrek toy, yet, but I figured I would at least ask since I don’t know the first thing about parenting and thus my own thoughts on the Happy Meal kerfuffle must be considered somewhat incompletely informed.

Honestly I’m not sure what to think. I don’t like McDonald’s; they don’t quite rank down there with walmart, e.g., but I have no sympathy for them. And they clearly do make every effort to intentionally recruit children into emotional blackmail directed at their own parents, which is self-evidently despicable.

On the other hand, banning Happy Meals just seems like another perfect example of the kind of busybody do-gooder overreach that gives liberalism a bad name. Moreover, popular opinion aside, it doesn’t even sit that well with me; our society genuinely does seem to be on a slippery slope leading to near-criminalization of fat and sugar. Laughable, perhaps, looking at America, but the “we know best” crowd seem to have learned their lesson from the failure of Prohibition. Rather than moving too fast and losing the whole game, the campaign against tobacco has slowly squeezed it out of mainstream American culture over a period of generations. (more…)