Author: Michael Janairo
-
Yinka Shonibare, MBE’s “Refugee Astronaut,” 2015
Yinka Shonibare, MBE’s “Refugee Astronaut,” 2015 
Yinka Shonibare, MBE’s “Refugee Astronaut,” 2015 
Yinka Shonibare, MBE’s “Refugee Astronaut,” 2015 -
Haiku movie reviews, May 2015
Ex Machina (2015)
A hot bot twists minds
As it takes the Turing test
High-tech interlude -
A view from my day job: One of Arturo Herrera’s latest paintings
Here’s something to brighten your morning.
An untitled painting by Arturo Herrera, which was made on a used book. -
Haiku movie reviews, April 2015
Big Hero 6 (2014)
A Disney-esque death
Of a heroic brother
Gives way to bedlamJersey Boys (2014)
Cops don’t kill these thugs
Valli’s sweet voice lifts them up
Tale worked best on stage -
In memory of Medill professor Bob McClory
“So I’m thinking it’s either a Pulitzer in six years, or a mental hospital for you.”
That was Bob McClory, a journalism professor of mine who died last Friday at age 82. Or at least that’s what I remember him saying at the end-of-the-quarter meeting about my writing and final grade when I was a journalism undergrad student at Medill at Northwestern.
He thought my continual use of quotation ledes ventured onto the less sane side of decision-making. What I heard though in that sentence was: I see what you’re doing. I don’t always get it or agree with you, but I believe in you. He probably said the same thing to lots of other students.
(more…) -
Haiku movie reviews, March 2015
Song of the Sea (2014)
Selkie seeks her voice
Her brother’s kind of a jerk
The spirits are saints?Vanity Fair (2004)
Novel: No hero
On Film: Reese Witherspoon stars
Story? Doesn’t work2 Guns (2013)
Rat-a-tat-tat — bang!
Two big stars come out shooting
The bodies pile upFury (2014)
I watched this tank flick
Riding on an Amtrak train
— steel machines roll on -
“ET HE UGLY RUTH” courtesy of a sponsored ad on Twitter
A young person I know recently said something along the lines that Twitter was going down the drain. I don’t where that idea came from. I’ve been using Twitter since Sept. 19, 2008. (which is longer than 99.755% of all other Twitter users, according to http://twopcharts.com/howlongontwitter).
Perhaps the young person was thinking of sponsored contents like the ad here from the Alliance for Quality Education of New York. I ignore most Twitter ads but this one got me because of the words “ET HE UGLY RUTH.”
(more…) -
Double-dog graphic design at the gas pump
The first thing that caught my eye at the gas pump the other day as the phrase “Free meat,” right there on the upper right of this sign. As gas fumes swirled in the cold air around me, which was tinged with the taste of the rock salt that covers roads, tires and car bodies, I couldn’t help but think that nothing sounded less appetizing than the desperation of a phrase like “free meat.”
Of course, that wasn’t the end of the line, but in my years as a headline writer I’ve come to respect linebreaks in a way a poet can understand. That the end of a line is an occasion for meaning. So I focused on “free meat,” before I realized that what the sign was really talking about was “free meat sauce” to go on the hot dogs, as well as “fixin’s.” So though the apostrophe may be correct as a way to signify a dropped letter, in this case a “g,” it also has the unintended consequence of making the word seem like it is a possessive (as in these signs).
Then I saw the hotdogs. Are they supposed to be cute and charming, dressed like chefs about to cook themselves? Is that why their smiles seem so forced, their eyes seemed to be crossed (as if to suggest lack of intelligence?), and the dog on the left is giving the finger? Are these subversive hot dogs?
Anyway: As I finished filling the tank, I was happy for this momentary distraction. It’s a lot better than the pumps that have the screens and the volume blaring at you. All I could think was that someone nearby was sitting at a desk and designed that thing, and someone else approved of it.
Good going, whoever you are!
