Things I find interesting today

This: Fake Memoirs via Parabasis (a very enjoyable blog)

Are fake memoirs the literary equivalent of reality TV? Why are we upset to find a memoir has been fictionalized, to whatever degree, while editing to create drama on otherwise "reality" shows is par for the course? Is it the more select, dare I say rarefied, circle of serious readers in this country? But people only seem to get upset when it's something huge and nasty a la Oprah + James Frey's Reese pieces. I mean, A Thousand Little Pieces. Of crap.

This: Florida's "Theory of..." via the New York Times

Are we seriously still having this "debate?"

"...last year when a committee appointed by the State Department of Education drafted a new set of science standards that, for the first time, actually used the word evolution and called it a fundamental concept underlying all of biology." How does one begin to teach biology without evolution? How does one teach how things are interrelated? If everything on this earth were equally and separately (and "intelligently") "designed", then what is the study of biology? Just looking at shit? That'd be like teaching numbers in math class but never getting around to actual algebra. Or teaching nouns without verbs. Jesus H. Christ. This is why all of Western Europe and most of the rest of the First World laugh at us. Out loud.

Ugh, I searched for a while for this perceptive letter written to the Times a few months ago about Western Europe felt toward the U.S., but I can't find it. The gist was...well, you probably get the gist.

I am so proud sometimes to speak English. English is the language of perhaps the greatest poet in post-classical history, Mr. Shakespeare. However, English has also given us "nucular." There's a large part of me that longs for a space that utilizes language not only correctly but with a certain verve and confidence that only a deep love for one's native speech allows. And, for the most part, we don't have that here in America. At least, it seems to me.

In French, when you refer to your "native language," the phrase is actually langue maternelle. Ie: your mother language. That's beautiful.