Only goats matter

For Halloween, let’s close out the month with BuzzFeed’s take on how the media will report the apocalypse. On the whole, I think they’ve rather holed it in one.

They certainly got the zeitgeist of Twitter right. (Especially that #prayforLondon thing.)

Someone wondered why the Statue of Liberty always seems to figure in apocalyptic visions, which caused me to run through the images again to investigate.

In fairness, it’s only the faux-New York Times that uses that particular icon. And you’d pretty much expect the editors there to conflate Liberty rising from the ruins with the destruction of civilization as anyone worth his fair-trade espresso defines it.

Or else people are just fixated on The Planet of the Apes.

However, I got the biggest charge out of modern farmer’s headline. Because, in the end…

Bad spirits

I’ve reported in the past about the elaborate yard decorations folks here in the Valley They Call Silicon put out for Halloween. There was one house in particular, in Sunnyvale, whose owners took weeks to fill it full of the worst kinds of creepiness around.

You can see the whole thing here, but just to refresh your memory, here are a couple of shots:

Imagine my disappointment, then, to swing by there earlier this month and find in progress…absolutely nothing. I was hoping that they might be procrastinating, but as of this past Monday, this pumpkin was the sum total of their effort:

  

Look, this is the yard that last year was dripping with death:

Yeah—just lawn death this time round. 

And here's spider dog:

I know that last year was much more elaborate than the year before, so perhaps they just got worn out. Even so—they have all those skeletons hanging around somewhere—would it have killed them to perch just one on their roof? Or sprinkle just a couple of spiders on the dog out front?

I don’t know what the Halloween equivalent of “bah, humbug!” would be, but I think my neighbors are communicating it.

Pre-flight

This being the week when people are thinking about weird clothing (or, here in the Bay Area, about weirder clothing), it seems appropriate that those wacky folks at Air New Zealand have released yet another version of the mandatory safety video.

And once again, it’s all about Middle Earth.

You’ll recall that ANZ produced a safety video a couple of years ago featuring hobbits and elves and the orcs I always seem to end up sitting next to in coach. They also have used Betty White and Love Boat retirees, as well as Richard Simmons in their quest to ensure that passengers pay attention.

The production this year features cameos by a few actors from Peter Jackson’s Hobbit film franchise (quelle surprise). It's being touted as "the most epic safety video ever made".  

They’re milking this “airline of Middle Earth” schtick to the full. But you must admit, they've got bags and bags of style.

Coming home

On Sunday, the US and UK withdrew their troops from Camp Leatherneck-Bastion, in Helmand province. The Afghan army will take over the joint base.

This action officially ends Britain’s combat mission that started 13 years ago. Our troops are remaining for another couple of years.

The two coalition forces lowered their flags, and bands played their national anthems, and then troops started loading onto transports.

The withdrawal on Sunday was made under tight security and a media blackout because of fears of Taliban attack. And the Washington Post reported, “On Monday, the last Marines sneaked out.”

You know, the thought of Marines “sneaking” anywhere except up on the enemy is kind of sick-making. What does that tell you about the nature of this 13-year-long war?

I am not entirely confident that the Afghans are fully ready to assume all the duties in Helmand. Since coalition forces arrived in 2001, 350 US Marines and 407 British soldiers have been killed there. I don’t like the thought of ground watered with their blood being lost to the Taliban.

But I’ll bet the families of these men and women are ecstatic that they’re on their way home.

Gratitude Monday: Multiple media

Today I’m grateful for web alternatives to radio.

Because the Bay Area’s only classical radio station, KDFC, is in a fund-raising drive, and they’re reverting to their old, pre-public radio habits.

When I first arrived here in the Valley they Call Silicon, KDFC was a commercial station, possibly about the last one in the US devoted to classical music. Although listening to them for any increment longer than five minutes made me refer to them as “classics lite”, because they never played an entire piece. The most you got was a movement from a concerto or a symphony or a sonata before a commercial came on.

But evidently even that ratio of ads-to-content wasn’t paying off, because in 2011 the station was sold to the University of Southern California, which operates KUSC as a classics-format station for LA.

Ergo the pledge breaks.

Well, fair enough.

But since they started their fall fundraiser last week, they haven’t played more than a movement from a concerto or a symphony or a sonata before they slam you with four or five minutes of pledge hype.

But they jumped the shark, in my opinion, yesterday, when they interrupted “The Heavens Are Telling” twice to ask for money.

Honest-to-Bach—how crass can you get?

Well, no—I shouldn’t ask that sort of thing. They’ll show me soon enough.

Meanwhile, I’ve got Pandora, and my own playlists that will get me through this drive just fine. So, once again—God bless the Internet.