A Few Muser and Random Quick Hits

Sorry I've been away.  Running like mad.

(1)  I think it was Junior who announced that he had discovered the perfect deodorant -- Old Spice Classic.  I laughed out loud.  I was tired of the heavily promoted sticks I'd been using and thought "hey, I used to like the smell of Old Spice aftershave [those torpedo-shaped bottles with the grey plastic cap], I'll give this a try." Got home, took off the cap, and about passed out.  It was the most potent sweet fragrance I'd ever experienced; it would stun Mike R's proverbial mastodon.  It almost embarrassed me to glide it on, but I did.  When I got out to the field, the receptionist told me I smelled nice.  So it either works or doesn't, depending on your point of view, but I imagined myself trailing vaporous hydrocarbons for the rest of the day.  I'm still using it.

(2)  A long time ago I made a note of a novel that Junior said was his favorite:  One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.  He mentioned it again on the occasion of Marquez's death on April 17.  I was also very moved by the novel; I read most of it lounging on a chaise on my uncle's patio in California one summer.  It's a wonderful read, even in translation, and I commend it to you.  Its first line is widely quoted:  "Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Areliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice."  (Trans. Gregory Rabassa.)  And you're off and running.

(3)  I was tired of people, including sponsors, saying "well played" or "nicely played" as though every praiseworthy act were nothing more than a game stratagem, the first time I heard them.

(4)  The consultants may be back at The Ticket.  The Musers were making great fun of something or other in the show being an "activation event" or "event deck" or "activation event deck."

(5)  Calling Gordon Keith, calling Gordon Keith:  You, like I, am a large P1 of McDonald's coffee.  Have you found lately that stores no longer allow you to take your black coffee and go to a little stand where you may select the proper number of Splendas and half-and-half cups and complete the final preparations on your own?  They ask you what you need and put it in themselves, or give you the packets and cups which you must specify at the time the purchase is negotiated.   Come to think of it  .  .  .  I've actually encountered some bad McDonald's in the last year, orders wrong, spotty service.

(6)  In the last thread, a commenter drew our intention to a Reddit subfile dedicated to The Ticket:  www.reddit.com/r/theticket.  It's pretty cool.  I confess, it made me wonder whether this site is any longer of value.

(7)  Why are these Muser quick hits?  Because, well, it's like this.  I mean, it doesn't really mean anything, much, and I don't really have a good explanation, to be perfectly honest with you (as Corby might say a few times), but:  I've been listening to a lot more of Cowlishaw & Mosely's Afternoon Show on ESPN lately.  They finally got Cowlishaw's mic situation fixed so he's mostly audible.  Like the chemistry, like the topics, like the talk.  Like the shorter ad breaks.