Category Archives: Unclassifiable

How waiters read your table. Some restaurants seem to be expecting a lot from people they pay poorly.

Hey, if you want to make dining a friendlier, more personal experience, you can start by telling your employees not to refer to everyone who walks in, regardless of gender, as "you guys."

I rarely agree with Farhad Manjoo, who covers matters of technology for Slate. But he's right that Weather Underground is the place to go for the best forecasts on the web. I actually pay attention to this stuff and W.U. is where I go. Like most of these sites, much of what they offer is the same National Weather Service data that's available to all. But if for no other reason that to have something unique to sell, most weather sites supplement the N.W.S. forecasts with their own computer models. For reasons Manjoo explains, Weather Underground does it better…and it's free unless you want to subscribe and see more radar info and a page that's free of advertising. That will run you a measly ten bucks a year.

My informal studies find that Accu-Weather is the worst, in part because they try to gain a competitive advantage by offering a 15-day forecast. Almost every other company is pushing their luck to go past ten. Projecting Days 11-15 during times of volatile weather is impossible…and even Accu-Weather is constantly revising whatever they say. My birthday is nine days from now. Two days ago, Accu-Weather said it would be raining in L.A. that day. Yesterday, they said it would be cloudy. When I looked earlier this morning, it said it would be sunny. So their long-range forecasts are essentially worthless.

Accu-Weather is the Pennsylania-based private weather company that was at the forefront of a move in 2005 to stop the National Weather Service from giving us the forecasts that are generated by our tax dollars. A bill introduced into Congress (but which went nowhere) would have prohibited this. It would not have stopped the N.W.S. from doing its business and we would still have been paying for it…but instead of just telling us if it was likely to rain, the N.W.S. would only have been able to release their findings to private weather companies which would have sold that information to us. This would be like if we put up toll booths on every major street and thoroughfare in the country and while we still paid to build them, we let Hallburton set up the booths and keep the money.

The Senator who introduced that bill — and who coincidentally took a helluva lot of "campaign contributions" from Accu-Weather — was Rick Santorum.

Brian Brushwood is a professional magician who credits Teller (of Penn &…) for the kind of attitude one needs to be successful in that line of work. On his blog, Brushwood tells of how he first met Teller and reprints an e-mail exchange that changed his life. Even if you never had any desire to saw women into individual sections or yank rabbits from chapeaus, you may find it inspirational.

Want to know what one-time Saturday Night Live star Tim Kazurinsky is up to these days? My pal Bruce Reznick sent me this link to an article about his current whereabouts. I always thought Kazurinsky was the funniest thing on SNL during a few years when not much was and I'm glad to see he's doing well. I also think that the idea of him and George Wendt doing The Odd Couple is great casting. Wish I could have seen that.

According to this article, the Arby's Roast Beef Sandwich chain is planning a complete makeover of the company with a new logo, a new restaurant design and a new menu. I wonder if they've considered adding roast beef to the concept.

Last weekend, I flew to and fro San Francisco and noticed something I'd never seen before. When you get off the plane and head for that room where your baggage takes a long, long time to tumble down a conveyor belt, you usually pass some limo drivers who are there to meet arriving passengers. They stand there holding up little signs on which they've chalked their passenger's name. But when I got to S.F., I saw five limo drivers and they were all holding up iPads, each of which had an arrivee's name displayed in a handsome font. And sure enough, there's even an app for that.

Someone named Lila writes to ask…

I see that Paul McCartney got his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame yesterday. The article said that he was voted the honor in 1993 but finally got around to accepting. But the article also said that his fellow Beatles got theirs years earlier. John Lennon, for example, got his in 1988. I don't understand that. How could you honor Lennon and not honor McCartney at the same time?

The Hollywood Walk of Fame, while I'm sure it's a great honor to most recipients, is basically a promotional vehicle. The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce wants celebrities to actually show up in person to accept them because that brings excitement and crowds and prestige to the area. They do a limited number of posthumous stars but if you're alive, they won't vote to give you one until you promise to be there for the unveiling ceremony. This is why David Letterman and Woody Allen (among others) have never been honored with stars while many lesser names have.

So the answer to your question is that Paul had never indicated a willingness to appear before 1993, whereas the other Beatles obviously had.

Someone has to submit you for consideration and there has to be some pledge from you that you'll appear. Then when they vote to give you one, you have five years to schedule your appearance…unless you're someone like Paul McCartney, in which case they'll rearrange the rules or vote an extension or whatever they did after Paul let the five years expire. The reason they give you five years is so you can work it into your busy schedule…but usually what it means is that you can arrange for the ceremony to coincide with the release of your new movie, the debut of your new TV show, etc. It is not a coincidence that Mr. McCartney has a new album being released at the moment.

That new album, by the way, is called Kisses on the Bottom, which is a line from the old song, "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter." Most of the album is old songs, including many by Frank Loesser. As my friend Shelly Goldstein reminded me, Sir Paul just happens to own Mr. Loesser's old music publishing company. So when those NBC stars were singing "Brotherhood of Man," the cash register was also ka-chinging at Paul's house, which is good. He probably needs the money. In fact, here's an Amazon link if you want to help the poor guy out by ordering the new CD or buying MP3s.

Ricky Gervais discusses being famous. I'm kinda amazed at the number of people who aren't famous but are certain their lives would be so much better in so many ways if they were.

I don't care how they refurbish the Matterhorn ride at Disneyland. They ain't getting me on it.

Hey, why do we call an obscene gesture "giving someone the bird?" Here's the explanation.

Hey, let's take a look at Five Luxury Items You Will (Probably) Never Own. What's kinda nice about it for me is it's also Five Luxury Items I Wouldn't Want…

A yacht? Never wanted one. The few times I've been on anything that might qualify as a yacht, I couldn't wait to be back on dry land. Even the most expensive was cramped and I just felt uneasy being on it as it swayed and rocked. I don't get seasick but I do like the feeling that I'm actually on the planet of my birth and I don't feel that way on small boats.

An island? Wouldn't take one if you gave it to me. What the heck would I do with it? Build a dwelling which, even after major expense, wouldn't have a tenth the comfort of my home? From my house, I can walk or easily drive to darn near anything I feel I need to make my life complete. If I want a feeling of isolation, I can just go around and tell people that I helped birth Scrappy Doo.

A watch? I haven't worn a watch since I was about twelve and I realized that I never really had a need to look at that thing I had strapped to my lower arm. About that time, my father's wealthy friend gave me a gold Paul Dominique watch that we had appraised for insurance reasons at about $2000.00. My father wouldn't accept money or gifts from this friend of his so the gift went to me…and since a 12-year-old boy really shouldn't be wearing a $2000.00 watch to school or anywhere, the present went into the family safe deposit box. I assume it's still in there though I haven't checked for about forty years.

A painting? I have two paintings by Jack Davis. What do I want with Juan Gris?

A jet? Same as the yacht. Once you get past impressing people with the fact that you own one, what's the point? Small, cramped, financially inefficient in terms of gas mileage…and the few folks I've known who had their own jet were forever having to figure out how to house their crew and have them available when needed. If I owned a private jet, I think I'd leave it parked at the airfield. I'd hire some extras to play my pilot and co-pilot whenever I had people over to see my private jet…and then once those people were gone, I'd run over and fly Southwest. Much simpler and cheaper, plus you get Rapid Rewards points.

So none of those five do it for me, I'm afraid. Right now, the only luxury item I want is a cell phone that doesn't drop the most important calls and bring the unsolicited sales pitches in loud and clear. But I don't think they make such a thing and if they did, I probably couldn't afford it.

Here's a list of 6 Hugely Successful Products Originally Invented for Something Else. I believe Silly Putty could also be on that list. Seems to me I read somewhere it was originally a failed attempt to come up with something that could be used to make tires during a wartime rubber shortage. It never worked for that though I believe Fred MacMurray had some success in that area in a movie once.