These Times Demand New Contractions

Can't, hasn't, gov't, and 'twon't have served us well through many centuries of linguistic laziness. We have them to thank for our being able to create contrarian, adversarial moods in a conversation in the space of just one syllable, and that's (another good one!) an important thing in these and all days. But like contract killings, contract lenses, and German ska band Lax Alex Contrax, contractions seems to be facing a contracting demand lately. No one says 'tis anymore unless he's quoting somebody dead, and for what reason? 'Tis a completely good contraction. I have created some new contractions for everyone to use in today's world.

Contract contraction fever. (I'm sorry, I can't turn it off.)

ton't - "to not"
usage example: "No, but I do want ton't pick up my room, Mom!"

'trocks/'tblows - "it rocks"/"it blows"
example: "'Trocks that you have a Mewtwo in your deck, but 'tblows that we're 23-year-olds playing Pokemon."
[Disclaimer: I don't even know if that's a good card.]

Here are a few more:

chop'd 'n screw'd
How aboutn't!
Whitec's'le
fo'clozzure
Kardash'n

Get them out there.

Real Old School Shit

2009 is definitely the year I will get better. I am going to try to sometimes do exercises, brush my teeth at night even when I'm drunk, and get psyched on classical music. I'm not sure where the last one came from, but I was cranking my Pandora radio station "Real Old School Shit" a few days ago and haven't really stopped listening since then. So color me amped about Sibelius, Mussorgsky, Manuel Cardoso, Smetana, Holst, Gershwin, C.P.E. Bach, and Philip Glass.

Not to detract anything from E-40's "The Ball Street Journal."

Ringtones are Ruining Pop Music

Finished writing this two-part screed right before going off to the Old(-school) World and it went up on EAR FARM right before I returned. It is said that Roman senator and orator Cato the Elder concluded every speech on every topic, whether about the slackening of republican morality, the logistics of the grain dole, or what happened to the days when twenty denarii bought you a hooker with at least the bottom set of teeth, with the words Carthago delenda est. "Carthage must be destroyed." That is how I feel about ringtones.

Article here.

My Other Blog is a Wine Blog

Do you like liquids fermenting of grape and altering of mind? Do you like blogs? Do you like anything?

Then there's a chance you will like the Actual Serious Blog I have been writing for since October, at the completely unlamented expense of this blog. It is for the Francis Ford Coppola Presents Encyclopedia line of wine that just launched in September; the blog is knoWine.com. The idea behind the blog and brand: young drinkers want to learn about wines of the world. The problem up to this point: most wine sources are primarily devoted to chalking up lists of recession-unfriendly bottles accompanied by evaluations of said bottles' performance on the palate, mostly described in varying shades of blackcurrant. The problem, of course, being that what does that even taste like?

So if you want to learn about what Riesling is or how French winemakers haze unsuspecting young charlatan American wine journalists, here is the link, again.

And for my stuff - here.