Tag Archives: my life

INFOGRAPHIC: ‘Golden Girls’ to ‘Desperate Housewives’

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Sunday’s series finale of “Desperate Housewives” provided me and my colleagues at The Boston Globe the opportunity to create a graphic showing how the show fits in with other TV shows with female foursomes. The concept was simple: “Desperate Housewives” is going away, but the archetypes that defined each character has been around on TV for a while, at least since “The Golden Girls.” And seems to continue with the new show, “Girls.”

Here’s the chart that ran on Sunday’s Arts section of The Boston Globe. Click for a larger view.

Boston Globe chart comparing Desperate Housewives, Golden Girls, Sex And The City, Hot In Cleveland, Living Single, Designing Women, Girls

 

Click on the links to the BostonGlobe.com version and the Boston.com version.

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HOW IT CAME TOGETHER

I had a professor who taught me several important things, but two things are important for this graphic:

  1. Anything can inspire an information graphic, whether it be a press release or a musing you have at a coffee shop.
  2. The characters in “Sex And The City” are perfect counterparts to the characters in “Golden Girls.”

In the years that have followed, I realized he was right. First, anything can lend itself to a graphic. I have several graphics in my portfolio that started out as conversations. I blogged last summer about a chart using the archetypes described in Joseph Campbell’s “The Hero With a Thousand Faces” to compare characters from the Harry Potter series, “Star Wars” and other franchises. It was a great blending of some of my favorite things: academic-minded critiques, pop culture and infographics.

Just as that graphic started with me talking about how Harry Potter was similar to other movies, this “Desperate Housewives” chart started with me talking with friends. I repeated my professor’s statement that the “Sex And The City” characters were very similar to the “Golden Girls” characters. When I’d tell this to people, they’d instantly see that Samantha was Blanche and that Charlotte was Rose. But what about Carrie? Was she Dorothy or Sophia? There were compelling arguments that she was Dorothy and Miranda was Sophia, but just as many people said Carrie was Sophia and Miranda was Dorothy.

Around this same time, “Desperate Housewives” premiered on ABC. I immediately watched, because it had not one but TWO “Melrose Place” alums: Marcia Cross and Doug Savant. I was hooked on this show that seemed equally inspired by “Knots Landing” drama, John Waters’ campiness and “Twin Peaks”-style darkness.

As it became apparent that this would be the last season, I came up with several graphic possibilities for the end of “Desperate Housewives.” The idea of viewing the show in a broader context seemed most appealing, because I knew that something too focused on the show wouldn’t get any play. I began to wonder how the ladies of Wisteria Lane fit in with “Golden Girls” and “Sex And The City.”

I floated the idea to a few people to test their interest. The debates were pretty good, and I realized I had a winner on my hands. I didn’t know if it would be something that the Boston Globe wanted, so I initially pitched it to Boston.com. I ended up getting several e-mails that indeed this could have a home in print and online.

FITTING IT ALL IN

The more I talked with editors, it was apparent that we could use several shows in this graphic. “Designing Women” had a similar formula, as did Betty White’s new show, “Hot In Cleveland.” “Girlfriends” and “Living Single” seemed to line up with this, as did “Noah’s Arc,” which was about four gay black men in Los Angeles. But if used shows about men, would we also use “Entourage”? It could become very unwieldy.

The solution was to run six in print. We cut “Hot In Cleveland” from the print version and instead used “Girls” as the modern show. But we kept “Hot In Cleveland” for the web versions. Michael Brodeur took my original text and punched it up, giving it some flair and humor. I had never seen “Girls,” so he helped identify which categories fit which characters.

I created two web versions, because this would live on both BostonGlobe.com and Boston.com. The sites have different palettes and styles, of course, but there’s another hitch. I had to design the BostonGlobe.com version responsively, meaning that I had to make sure it could be viewed (and readable!) on any browser, on any platform, on any screen, at any size.

You saw the chart at the top of the page. How can that be read on a mobile device?

Here’s how one of the TV shows would appear on the iPhone’s portrait view of the BostonGlobe.com version:


And here’s how a show would look in the iPhone’s landscape view, or on some tablets:

On larger screens, it appeared the way it did in print: as a full grid.
Click on the links to the BostonGlobe.com version and the Boston.com version.

If Leonardo da Vinci tinkered the way George Lucas does…

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In the weeks since we’ve learned that George Lucas has tinkered with “Star Wars” yet again, this time for the Blu-ray release, the nerds have been livid.

I realize many of my non-“Star Wars” friends might not be able to appreciate what this means, so I decided to put it in terms you might understand.

I decided to show it terms of what it would be like if Leonardo da Vinci decided to mess with “The Last Supper” after it had been critically acclaimed and beloved for years.

Here we have the original version of “The Last Supper” by Leonardo da Vinci. In our example, this functions as the stand-in for the original “Star Wars” trilogy. In a word, a masterpiece.

If da Vinci did to 'The Last Supper' what George Lucas has done to 'Star Wars'

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In 1997, George Lucas re-released the trilogy with changes. Some of them were CGI changes to certain scenes. They were changes that were so nuanced that you’d have to look at the original and new version side by side to notice the differences. But there were two main changes:

1. In “Star Wars,” when Han Solo encounters Greedo and shoots him, the scene was changed to have Greedo shoot first and have Han fire a defense shot. Before, Han shot and killed him just because he was done with Greedo’s nonsense. But in the new version, it was an act of self defense. This angers the geeks to no end.

2. In “Return of The Jedi,” Lucas added a musical number to the scene in Jabba’s palace. It involves monsters singing and dancing as if it’s a Muppet show. That is what irks me.

So, these changes are akin what it would be like if da Vinci decided he wanted to horizontally flip “The Last Supper” and add in some of the canines from the “Dogs Playing Poker” painting.

If da Vinci did to 'The Last Supper' what George Lucas has done to 'Star Wars'

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Around the time “Stars Wars: Episode III —- Revenge of The Sith” was released, Lucas tweaked with the original trilogy again. This time, he changed the end of “Return of The Jedi” to use imagery of the new Anakin Skywalker, replacing the original footage.

To me, this akin to da Vinci saying, “OK, now I’m going to add Urkel from ‘Family Matters.'”

If da Vinci did to 'The Last Supper' what George Lucas has done to 'Star Wars'

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Then we found out that the Blu-ray versions would have even more changes, which was like adding a PhotoShop filter to something he’d already tinkered with a bunch of times.

If da Vinci did to 'The Last Supper' what George Lucas has done to 'Star Wars'

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And when we learned what those changes would be, it was even worse.

If da Vinci did to 'The Last Supper' what George Lucas has done to 'Star Wars'

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It would be like your mom deciding that your favorite meal she prepared was still not good enough, so he had to change it. She’d add thumbtacks, staples and manure until it was “just right.”

That’s what you’ve done to us, George Lucas. You’ve added manure to our favorite dish.

Ben Folds, “Rockin’ The Suburbs” and the visceral pain of memory

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You can hear a soft but undeniable thud in the first second of “Annie Waits,” the opening track to Ben Folds’ album, “Rockin’ The Suburbs.” That first second and the entire album that followed set the tone for how I would remember the day on which that album was released.

September 11, 2001.

Ben Folds' first solo album, Rockin' the Suburbs

It seems silly and almost blasphemous to mark the anniversary of that album’s release when today has a much more momentous and globally profound anniversary. But for me and for at least a few other people, that album became our cave for months after 9/11. We were 19 and 20, scared of the future, judgmental of our pasts and unsure of the present. That basically describes a lot of my twenties, and particularly my college days. Discovering Ben Folds was rather serendipitous, because he was the patron saint of being scared of the future, judgmental of his own past and unsure of the present. Songs about crazy girlfriends, growing up, suburban nerds and fired journalists would appealed to us, a dorm full of suburban nerds with crazy girlfriends during a time when J-school seemed daunting. And when you consider that the whole album’s theme could be summed up as “musings about growing up and dealing with the pains of impending adulthood,” it seemed fitting for us to discover the album when we did.

Christmas came and with it, New Year’s Day. The visceral reaction to that day was replaced with an abstract “What does it all mean?” perspective, which involved less crying. My friends and I continued our sequences at The University of Missouri School of Journalism, and quicker than we knew it, we were working on projects for the first anniversary of Sept. 11.

And all the while, we were listening to Ben Folds. I saw him live in concert four times between September 2001 and November 2002. My friend Josh saw him at least five times during that same time.

I didn’t realize until now, but my streak of seeing Ben Folds live ended around the first anniversary of 9/11. Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised. Maybe that album was tied too closely to a period that hurt too much for me to revisit on a regular basis. Which is a shame, because that album has some great songs. Of course, one of those songs is about a journalist getting unceremoniously laid off, and that, too, is not something I want to think of on a daily basis.

When it comes to music and Sept. 11, I don’t want to return to that day. I’d rather listen to Bruce Springsteen’s “The Rising” and return to the summer after 9/11. Springsteen’s album, and particularly the title track, provided a hopeful release for the emotions. If music has to take me back to 9/11 memories, I’d prefer it take me to Sept. 11, 2002.

With “The Rising” and other music inspired by 9/11, I can prep myself and think of it philosophically. I’ve been inundated by enough images, sound bites and musings about that day that I’ve been so overwhelmed that I can’t muster up a reaction.

Memory is a visceral thing. It has its own senses: its own smells, its own tastes, its own sounds. Try as I might to numb myself to certain memories, it is those smells, tastes and sounds that triumph, taking me back in time. Sometimes taking me to places I don’t want to go.

But if I go to the actual music of that day, I go back to the sounds, tastes and memories I don’t want to remember. I can try to suppress thoughts, but smells and sounds are stronger than that. And in the case of Ben Folds, he takes me back to a time before I learned how to suppress things.

RELATED: 9/11 in pop culture

My moot point against Rick Springfield and “Jessie’s Girl”

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Happy Birthday to Rick Springfield, who turns 62 on Tuesday. He is best remembered for his 1981 song, “Jessie’s Girl.” And best known to my friends as the guy who spawned my now defunct war on the word “moot.”

When I was a copy editing intern, my friend and I bonded over stories of our favorite pet peeves and word misuses. I had the pedestrian ones everyone has: “their/there/they’re” and “you’re/your.” But my friend one-upped me with her distaste for Rick Springfield and his use of the word moot.

I was intrigued. Why would this bug a copy editor? In the song, Rick declares his love for his friend’s girlfriend. He says, “I want to tell her that I love her, but the point is probably moot.”

That use of the word is acceptable in the vernacular, but according to Merriam-Webster, the word has two meanings:

  1. open to question : debatable : subjected to discussion : disputed
  2. deprived of practical significance : made abstract or purely academic

Similarly, the definitions from the OED:

  1. Originally in Law, of a case, issue, etc.: proposed for discussion at a moot (MOOT n.1 4). Later also gen.: open to argument, debatable; uncertain, doubtful; unable to be firmly resolved. Freq. in moot case, [moot] point.
  2. N. Amer. (orig. Law). Of a case, issue, etc.: having no practical significance or relevance; abstract, academic. Now the usual sense in North America.

“Jessie’s Girl” used the word in its second meaning: not worth debating, already decided, irrelevant, etc. But that wasn’t the FIRST definition given in the dictionaries, and upon later, research, it wasn’t necessarily the original definition of the word.

According to TheFreeDictionary.com:

The adjective moot is originally a legal term going back to the mid-16th century. It derives from the noun moot, in its sense of a hypothetical case argued as an exercise by law students. Consequently, a moot question is one that is arguable or open to debate. But in the mid-19th century people also began to look at the hypothetical side of moot as its essential meaning, and they started to use the word to mean “of no significance or relevance.” Thus, a moot point, however debatable, is one that has no practical value. A number of critics have objected to this use, but 59 percent of the Usage Panel accepts it in the sentence The nominee himself chastised the White House for failing to do more to support him, but his concerns became moot when a number of Republicans announced that they, too, would oppose the nomination. When using moot one should be sure that the context makes clear which sense is meant.

Back then, we zealous 22-year-old copy editors thought that the first definition should be the primary definition and that it must be Rick Springfield’s fault for the opposite definition. In our minds, the word had meant  “disputed, debatable and open to discussion” until the very moment he released “Jessie’s Girl” as a single.

From that moment on, I adopted my friend’s dislike for Rick Springfield. I disparaged him whenever I heard him.

On a movie soundtrack…


On a jukebox…

This went on for about four years. Then, I became more accepting of the changing nature of words. Many people will say “podium” when they mean “lectern.” “Presently,” which meant “in the immediate future,” became an acceptable substitute for “currently.” If we were really sticklers for word use, Otis Redding’s “(Sittin’ On) The Dock Of The Bay” would really be “(Sittin’ On) The Pier Of The Bay.” The dock, which can mean “landing pier,” also means the water right around the pier.

But we’ve forgiven those deviations and have even incorporated them into our language. And, as language evolves, it’s important to recognize what people will understand and won’t understand. If most people know “moot” to mean “irrelevant” and “not debatable,” then I’m fighting a losing battle if I try to use the original meaning. Language evolves, and so I had to evolve as well.

So I had to find another reason to mock Rick Springfield.

For more on the word “moot,” check out this blog post on Talk Wordy To Me.

20 years after “black album,” Metallica’s platinum records compared

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It was 20 years ago this week, on Aug. 12, 1991, that Metallica’s self-titled fifth studio album was released. In the two decades since its release, the “black album” has become Metallica’s defining album. It is certified 15X platinum, far above any other studio album by the band.

Five years later, the band teamed up once again with Bob Rock, the producer of the “black album” (so named for its black cover). “Load,” Metallica’s sixth studio album, was released in the summer of 1996. Hardcore fans said that the band had “sold out.” Some said it was because the band members had cut their hair. My friend Ned felt conflicted buying “Load,” but I told him that his long hair made up for their sins of cutting their glorious manes.

Anywho, for the 20th anniversary of the album that spawned “Enter Sandman” and “Sad But True,” I thought I’d look up the band’s platinum certifications on Recording Industry Association of America’s website. Using the RIAA’s listings, I created the following chart of when the band’s nine studio albums were certified platinum, double platinum, triple platinum, and so on.

Of course, another way to compare how many times each album went platinum would be to use bars. Here is each album and its number of platinum certifications, by order of release:

What can these charts tell us?

  • The “black album” is definitely the Metallica’s biggest commercial success. Add up the number of platinum certifications for all the studio albums they’ve done since and you won’t still won’t match it.
  • The band’s platinum certifications increase with each album through the “black album” and then decrease with each album after that. Of course, all of this is with the hindsight of 20 years. The newer albums might eventually be certified platinum again after they’ve been “out long enough” to catch up with the others. I’m not sure that will happen, though.
  • In the 2000s (whatever that decade is to be called), the Metallica albums that continued to get certified had been released between 1984 and 1991.
  • The post-“black album” records see an initial jump but don’t continue getting certified the way that the other non-“black album” discs do. Again, those older albums have been out a lot longer, so they have had the time to climb steadily.

Another thought

Bob Rock produced that record and every studio album through “St. Anger” in 2003. They used a different producer for “Death Magnetic,” which a lot of die-hard fans think is the best in 20 years. My theory? Fans who gravitated toward the unpolished sounds of the first four albums liked that familiar style in “Death Magnetic.” “Metallica” had a lot more polished sound and each album sounded cleaner and cleaner. “Death Magnetic,” though, sounds like it’s going to rob you, knife you and then eat you.

Of course, maybe it’s simpler than that. Maybe it’s not Bob Rock, the band members’ hair or any of that. Many bands or artists have that classic album to which fans will compare every other album that band or artist will release. For Metallica, it’s the “black album.” Those guys could cure cancer and some headbanger would say, “That’s good and all, but it’s no ‘black album.'”

Del Taco, a flying saucer and a nostalgia for a past St. Louis

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There’s a big kerfluffle in my hometown of St. Louis this week. A UFO-looking building, which until midnight was home to a Del Taco franchise, was presumably going to be demolished. The property’s owner didn’t think anyone would take the property and keep the building intact. The Board of Aldermen voted Wednesday on a bill that would provide tax abatement for whomever developed the property, and on Thursday, the bill’s sponsor added a provision to the bill that would force the demolition to go before the city’s Preservation Board. Still, the preservationists are skeptical that the building will be preserved.

It might be hard to understand the fervor for the building. Certainly there’s no fervor for the business within the building. The Del Taco franchise didn’t make much money. In December 2009, the independent operator who had been subleasing the building filed for bankruptcy. I would think that the people who cared about the Del Taco would have shown up by now. But in the weeks since the building’s possible demolition was announced, there have been Facebook pages, a petition and blogging campaigns to save the late-’60s era building.

Why? What’s so special about this building? I’ve had to ask myself that question a few times this week.

When I first heard that the flying saucer building on South Grand could be torn down, I felt a pang of nostalgia. It reminded me of when I was a kid, and I felt that was reason enough to save it. After some thought, I realized I had never even gone through the drive-thru there, let alone inside. I had been to the other Del Taco, but not the one in the flying saucer building. Thus, my only memories of it were seeing it as I drove into the cities from the suburbs.

But I had this righteousness that they shouldn’t tear down such a historic building. Of course, until I started reading about the building, I had no idea it had been built in the 1960s as a gas station. I had attached a sense of nostalgia to a place I only saw from a car. Why was this place so important? I didn’t even grow up in the city. I grew up in the county. And I haven’t lived there since 2000.

So, why am I and other kids from the suburbs suddenly following this on Facebook, with a sense of nostalgia for a building we hadn’t thought of in years? There are a few reasons at play, and only a few have to do with the building itself.

Photo by Laura Miller/Riverfront Times

Photo by Laura Miller/Riverfront Times

For starters, it is a cool building. It looks like a flying saucer, and is a testament to some of the interesting architecture that’s harder to find in St. Louis these days. Past has shown that interesting buildings don’t get replaced with interesting buildings. The Parkmoor was torn down for a Walgreen’s, the Arena was torn down for an office park. Historic architecture has been replaced with things that no longer distinguish the neighborhoods. You could have a Walgreen’s in Wentzville or an office park in Chesterfield, but you won’t find a flying saucer there.

St. Louis is a city with a fragile ego. The city as a whole is still smarting over the fact that InBev bought Anheuser Busch, which is one of several big companies that are no longer headquartered in St. Louis. There are people there who remember the days when St. Louis thought of itself in the same leagues as New York and Chicago. St. Louis had several major companies. St. Louis had four sports teams. St. Louis had a thriving downtown. That’s in the past, but it hurts, even for people who were born long after the city’s heyday. The inferiority complex has been passed down to generations. Quite simply, St. Louis is a Jan Brady — the overlooked middle sister — smarting over how it used to be Marcia, the pretty older sister who commanded attention.

In a column from July 2009 about “Meet Me In St. Louis,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist Bill McClellan captured some of this feeling pretty well:

Back when the country was founded, the successful people had no reason to leave the East Coast. The less successful pushed west. This clump of unsuccessful people reached St. Louis. The adventurous ones pushed on. The slackers stayed here. Much later, we built the Gateway Arch to honor the people who had the gumption to keep going. We are the only city in the world that has a memorial to honor those who left.

So this whole thing about leaving and not leaving is in our DNA.

This underlying zeitgeist is important in understanding things in St. Louis. Nothing exists in a vacuum, and these old wounds surface at the oddest times. The guilt over not doing enough to improve the city. The guilt over leaving the city altogether. The guilt of riding someone else’s nostalgia for a building I never even entered.

So, this isn’t really about a Del Taco. Or a flying saucer. It’s about a symbol.

WEB COMIC: The conversation many journalists hate, pt. 1

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I sometimes wonder what it would be like if we were all so cavalier to introduce our grievances about topic X as soon as we learn about someone’s allegiance to said topic. Or how inappropriate it would be if we talked about a stranger’s recently deceased relatives the way we talk about their recently laid-off colleagues.

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Web Comic: 10 Reasons You Should Hire A Journalist

10 things you might not know about St. Patrick’s Day

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March 17 is St. Patrick’s Day, a religious holiday in Ireland and a secular holiday everywhere else. For a guy named Patrick, it’s like a second birthday. But anyone can enjoy this holiday, whether you’re an Irishman, a descendant of one or a “little Chinese boy in the suburbs pretending to be Irish in the middle of March.”

I now present 10 things you might not have known about St. Patrick or his Feast Day. Don’t feel bad; I didn’t know a lot of these myself, and I’m named after the guy.

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1. St. Patrick was not Irish.
He was from Britain, back when Britain was still a Roman colony. In the late 300s when the Irish began raiding Britain, he was abducted and brought back to Ireland, where he was a slave for the better part of a decade.

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2. St. Patrick was not originally named Patrick.
He chose the name Patrick for himself when he was ordained as a Catholic priest. He was originally named Maewyn Succat. After his years as a slave, he returned to England, where he had a vision that the Irish needed him. When he became a priest, he took Patrick as his Christian name.

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3. The original color associated with St. Patrick and his feast day was blue.
There was even a shade called St. Patrick blue. But the Emerald Isle is overwhelmingly lush, making green a more natural color with which the Irish could identify. Political groups later adopted the shamrock (and thus the color green), solidifying green as a part of Irish nationalism.

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4. He did not literally “drive the snakes out of Ireland.”
Ireland never even had any snakes. The “banishing of the snakes” was a metaphor for the banishing of evil and St. Patrick’s hand in Ireland’s conversion to Christianity. Within 200 years of Patrick’s arrival, Ireland was completely Christianized.

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5. The association between St. Patrick and the shamrock may be overstated.
It’s been said that the shamrock is associated with St. Patrick’s Day because St. Patrick used the shamrock to explain the Christian concept of the trinity: the Father, The Son and the Holy Spirit, each separate but the same. He might have used this metaphor, but it appears nowhere in any of his writings, which detail so much of his philosophies and teachings. If St. Patrick kept such fastidious notes about his work, how come he never mentioned this? So, according to the History Channel, this could be a myth, but we have no way of verifying.

The shamrock ended up being used by political groups in the last 300 years, though, in part because of the association with St. Patrick. But the national symbol of Ireland is not the shamrock; it’s the harp.

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6. Corned beef and cabbage is not associated with the holiday in Ireland.
The traditional meal for St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland is bacon and potatoes. Bacon and pork in general have historically been a big part of the Irish diet. Corned beef was eaten in Ireland, too, but it’s been more emphasized by Irish Americans. When many Irish immigrated to the U.S. in the early 1900s, they found that their reputation for loving pork preceded them. Anti-Irish cartoons featured stereotypical Irishmen with pigs, saying, “Here comes Paddy with his pig!” Beyond the anti-pork Irish slurs, there’s a much simpler reason the Irish Americans turned to corned beef and cabbage: it was much more affordable than bacon and potatoes.

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7. St. Paddy, not St. Patty
Patrick comes from the Irish name “Padraig.” The shortened form of that is Paddy. The name Patty is short for Patricia, the feminine form of the name. So, if you say St. Patty’s Day, you’re actually referring to the Feast Day of St. Patricia of Naples, which is August 25.

It’s easy to see how “Patty” and “Paddy” became confused in America. Americans enunciate the two words the same, whereas the Irish would pronounce a harder “T” sound, thus making the names distinguishable. An American would hear the Irish name Paddy and think it was Patty. It wouldn’t occur to people unfamiliar with the name Padraig that it should be Paddy. After all, Bobby works for the name Bob, so why wouldn’t Patty work for Pat?

But now you know. After years of mistakenly being called Patty, I’m reclaiming my masculinity. You can call me Patrick, Pat or Paddy, but not Patty.

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8. Leprechauns were only recently associated with the holiday, by Americans.
The drunk, impish troublemakers who trick you and lead you to pots of gold are really a fabrication of Walt Disney’s “Darby O’Gill and The Little People” and the marketing geniuses behind Lucky Charms. Before those brands recast the leprechaun as benevolent tricksters, leprechauns weren’t associated with St. Patrick’s Day, because leprechauns were scary bastards. They were part of pagan tradition that predated St. Patrick’s arrival in Ireland by centuries. Leprechauns were a type of fairies who guarded areas and tried to scare you away. The modern version of leprechauns are based on anti-Irish cartoons that were based on derogatory stereotypes.

I remember middle school, when the “Leprechaun” movies first came out. These three kids in my English class would tell “yo mama” jokes, trying to outdo the other. Whenever someone busted out “Yo mama look like the ‘Leprechaun!,'” it was OVER. You can’t come back from that.

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9. March 17 is believed to be the day St. Patrick died.
Many Feast Days for Catholic saints tend to be on the saint’s death date, or day associated with his or her death. St. Patrick is believed to have died on March 17, 461. For Catholics in Ireland, the day is a Holy Day of Obligation. In other words, a day on which attending Mass is mandatory.

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1o. The first St. Patrick’s Day parade in America is believed to have been in Boston in 1737.
It’s not universally accepted, though, as there are those who say the first St. Patrick’s Day parade was in New York in 1762. Others say it was in Philadelphia in 1780.

March 17 is used to be a city holiday in Boston, Cambridge and Somerville and thus used to be a day off for school kids and anyone employed by the city. It’s technically not for St. Patrick’s Day, though, but Evacuation Day, the day the last of the British left the city. It’s convenient that it falls on St. Patrick’s Day, though.

UPDATE: Governor Deval Padraig Patrick signed a law requiring government offices in Suffolk County to open on Evacuation Day and Bunker Hill Day. Read more here.

UPDATE, AGAIN: To test your knowledge of the South Boston St. Patrick’s Day parade, take this Boston.com Your Town quiz.

Snakes on a train!

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A funny thing happened on the way to the office on Thursday. A woman announced she had lost her snake, causing unrest among fellow passengers and slight delay on the red line.

You might have read Eric Moskowitz’s brief about it on Metro Desk. Or Moskowitz’s story in Friday’s paper, in which you-know-who was quoted. Or, you might have read the first-person account.

Yes, this was a popular story on Thursday. That says a lot, considering what else went on that day:

  • Governor Deval Patrick was inaugurated for a second term
  • Ellen Weiss stepped down as the top news executive at National Public Radio
  • Former Massachusetts state Senator Dianne Wilkerson was sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison for taking $23,500 in bribes

And yet, the phantom snake slithered its way into the news cycle.

Of course, I still could see a snake on a train sometime:

The T does not expressly prohibit snakes. Guide dogs and other service animals are allowed at all hours, while nonservice pets are allowed only during off-peak hours. Dogs should be well behaved and properly leashed, while small domestic animals must be carried in lap-size containers and kept out of the way of exits, according to T policy.

Good to know.

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UPDATE

This story continued. Melissa, who lost her snake, put an ad on Craigslist (which has since expired). In an interview with WCVB-TV, Melissa shared pictures of Penelope, the missing snake.

Joel Abrams of Boston.com put together a dramatization of the event, using Xtranormal, a text-to-movie site.

Most of the dialogue comes direct quotes of Melissa, either from Eric’s story, my account or the Craigslist ad.

An open letter to Marc Cherry

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Dear Marc Cherry,

I can suspend disbelief on a lot of things that happen in “Desperate Housewives.” The annual disaster right before the season takes a break between Christmas and New Year’s, for example. But there’s one thing that eats at me more and more as time goes on.

Time.

This show has messed with time more than “Lost,” “Quantum Leap” and “Back To The Future” combined. Except those shows acknowledged they messed with time. I just would at one point to have a character acknowledge that Parker used to be a year or two older than the twins, not five years younger. But I digress.

Last night’s episode pegs MJ as being 9. MJ was born right before “Desperate Housewives” jumped ahead five years. Thus, if he was born at the end of season 4, which ended with the five-year jump, he was 5 years old at the beginning of season 5, right? And if it’s season 7 now, and he’s 9, then did the last two seasons take four years?

It couldn’t have been last year that took that much time, because Lynette was pregnant with Paige from the end of the fifth season to the end of the sixth. And Paige is still a baby, hence the Susan-as-nanny plotline.

Which leads me, Mr. Cherry, to believe that season 5 took three years. Thus, the only logical explanation for MJ not aging to look like a 9-year-old is that he must be like Gary Coleman.

Of course, if MJ is 9, we have yet another problem, Marc Cherry. At the beginning of this season, Bree confessed that “10 years ago,” Andrew ran over Mama Solis. That was before the five-year jump, which MJ’s age establishes as 9 years ago. But that was also one of the first things in “Desperate Housewives.” Thus, we’d be led to believe that all of the first four seasons happened in one year? Danielle’s pregnancy? The Chinese housekeeper’s pregnancy? The poor boy locked in the basement?

And what about Tom having an affair with Renee 20 years ago? Wouldn’t that be when he would have impregnated Nora, before he knew Lynette?

This is just redonkulous. More redonkulous that the supermarket shoot-out, the tornado, the nightclub fire, the Christmas plane crash and the felon riot combined.

I’m worried that this is setting us up for the eventual “Desperate Housewives” finale, when we learn it was all in Mary Alice’s head right before she shoots herself, and that the series was a sham. It was done by “Dallas,” though. But then again, so was the “Who shot the bastard that no one likes” plotline currently unfolding on Wisteria Lane.

But don’t worry, Marc Cherry. This does not mean I won’t watch. Clearly, I’m watching. So, if your gimmick is to mess with our heads and have us checking calendars, we’ll keep watching.
–PMG.