Repost: Tazi's Corner: Issue #6: Thoughts On Reading (Part II)

Hello, readers, and welcome to another edition of

Tazi's Corner
Life As Your Pet Sees It!
This week I present Part II of my thoughts on reading! Why the split piece? Because I know that attention spans can be short and when blogs are too long people lose interest - so I decided to take my cue from Quentin Tarantino a la Kill Bill and cut the blog into two parts!

In my meanderings for Part I of this topic (found in last week’s Tazi's Corner column), I found the Random House Publishers Collection of Must Read Books, which I also found to be rather pretentious. I am not saying the books on it were not excellent choices; but it was rather predictable with choices like Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five (#18) and J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye (#64). Maybe I am biased...I used to know a pretentious blowhard who said those were his favorite books; but the fact remains that these books are what are referred to a “serious books”, as if a Writer (with a capital W) is only a writer (with a lower-case w) until he or she has published one, and until then they will only be a producer of pulp – interesting but unmemorable. I find this thought unacceptable! Jaws is not what I would call a “serious” book but it is definitely worth reading (just not on the beach) and is most certainly memorable. In fact, it makes my personal list of classic books, along with Mario Puzo’s The Godfather (yes, it was a book before it was a movie).

I have decided to add my paw-print to the numerous online lists of literary classics by adding my own right here. In no particular order after the number one spot, I present

Tazi’s List of 39 Must Read Modern 

(and Not So Modern) Classics! 

Please feel free to add suggestions of your own to bring the list to a less random number:

1. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee

2. Cold Sassy Tree, by Olive Ann Burns

3. Brothers and Sisters, by Bebe Moore Campbell

4. Your Blues Ain’t Like Mine, by Bebe Moore Campbell

5. The Godfather, by Mario Puzo

6. Jaws, by Peter Benchley

7. The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, by C.S. Lewis

8. The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien

9. The Lord of the Rings (complete trilogy), J.R.R. Tolkien

10. It, by Stephen King

11. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare*, by William Shakespeare**

12. The Complete Works of Edgar Allen Poe, by E.A. Poe

13. Beloved, by Toni Morrison

14. Treasure Island, by Robert Lewis Stevenson

15. A Christmas Carol (annotated edition), by Charles Dickens

16. Le Comte De Monte Cristo/The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas 

(English translation or original French)

17. Le Fantôme de L’Opéra/The Phantom of the Opera, by Gaston Leroux 

(English translation or original French)

18. Le Petit Prince/The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupery 

(English translation or original French)

19. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (aka Philosopher’s Stone, U.K. version), by J.K. Rowling

20. Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott

21. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, by Mark Twain

22. Sula, by Toni Morrison

23. How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents, by Julia Alvarez

24. The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan

25. The Maltese Falcon, by Dashiell Hammett

26. The Color Purple, by Alice Walker

27. Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe, by Fannie Flagg

28. The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, by Washington Irving

29. Johnny Tremain, by Esther Forbes

30. All the President’s Men, by Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward (non-fiction)

31. In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote (non-fiction)

32. Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman

33. Charlotte's Web, by E.B. White (read it aloud to a child!)

If Wishbone can pull off this gig, so can we!

34. The Cider House Rules, by John Irving

35. The Princess Bride, by William Goldman (It was a book first? INCONCEIVABLE!)

36. The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle

37. The Westing Game, by Ellen Raskin

38. The DaVinci Code (fully illustrated version), by Dan Brown

39. And Then There Were None (Ten Little Indians, U.K. version), by Agatha Christie

Apologies to Derek P. of South Carolina for leaving Hollywood Wives, by Jackie Collins, off of this list.

Snuggles,
Tazi

*Contrary to the title, it is not all of the works of William Shakespeare
**Some contend that Sir Francis Bacon deserves author credit for this selection


Ask Tazi! is ghostwritten by a human with a Bachelors of Arts in Communications. Tazi-Kat is not really a talking feline.

Tazi's Corner #24: Tazi-Kat's List Of Worst Christmas Songs Ever

[Ed. Note: Email readers may not see the embedded videos. Please click on the song titles to open a new window and view/listen].

Dear Readers,

A Merry Christmas season to all who celebrate! This year, as my Christmas gift to you, I have decided to do a little research into what family, friends, and strangers with whom I come into contact think are the worst Christmas songs ever – and then, I clawed apart the lyrics to see why they were so bad! There were many, many entries, and I had to spend valuable nap-time to sort through them all, but for my readers I will brave even a lack of sleep! Without further ado, I present…

Tazi-Kat’s List of 

Top Five Worst Christmas Songs Ever

#5 – Last Christmas, by Wham!

As my Mommie’s brother pointed out, this song is not a Christmas song; it is “a breakup song! George Michael just added the word ‘Christmas’ to it and set it to a jingly beat!” I used to kinda-sorta like this song (until the cast of Glee covered it); now, it ranks at #5 on my list.

#4 – Christmas Shoes, by New Song/Bob Carlisle

The reason this song is so pathetically bad is that is designed to bring people to tears over someone else’s misfortune, but when you actually dissect the lyrics you find several large problems with the entire scenario, starting with the fact that a little boy is allowed to run to the shoe store, by himself, while his mother lay on her deathbed! Yeah, that’s very believable…actually, it is more believable than a kid knowing his Mom’s shoe size.

#3 – Father Christmas, by The Kinks 

Perhaps one of the more rockin’ Christmas songs out there, I admit that I have been caught tapping my tail to the beat! However, the whole song is about how a bunch of young, poor children of unemployed parents mugged Santa and made violent requests like “a machine gun, so I can scare all the kids down the street”. The song then suggests that we all “remember all the kids who got nothin’ while you’re drinking down your wine”. Haven’t these people never hear of Toys for Tots or other charities that assist with holiday gifts for the poor?  There is no reason why deserving children should receive nothing for Christmas. On the other hand, children who mug Santa do not deserve presents…

#2 – We Wish You An Adequate Festive Period, by The Happees 

Although the picture of a cat with human hands instead of paws gives me the creeps, I personally love this song and have been posting it to Facebook (ad nauseam) since last Christmas. Unfortunately, not everybody is feeling the love for “Dracula laughing for no reason”, which is why this song makes it to #2 on my list (I am saving the #1 spot for a very special song!). A warning for all who choose to play this song: You will not be able to get it out of your head! (My Mommie posted this song to RI Governor Lincoln Chafee's Facebook page in protest of his calling the State House Christmas Tree a "Holiday Tree").

#1 – Do They Know It's Christmas?, by Band Aid 

This song has a very catchy tune, but have you ever listened to the lyrics? They are fraught with bad information! This song deserves a list of its own, so here are the Top 5 worst lyrics in the Worst Christmas Song Ever!

5.      “There’s a world outside your window, it’s a world of dreaded fear, where the only water flowing is a bitter sting of tears”

Has Band Aid never heard of the Nile River? It’s only the longest river in the world, running for over 4,000 miles, from Northeastern Africa straight through to the Eastern-central part of the continent! Additionally, there are dozens of rivers that flow through the various regions of the African continent, and let's not forget Lake Victoria; it's the main reservoir of the Nile River, and the largest lake in the world!

4. “And there won’t be snow in Africa this Christmastime…”

In 1899, author Joseph Conrad referred to Africa as “the dark continent”; apparently, Band-Aid still sees it that way, generalizing the continent as one giant, generic region, and not a multitude of different countries and climates that make up this vast land that spans the world's two hemispheres. (FYI, Band-Aid: Many regions of the African continent see snow).

3. “Where nothing ever grows, no rain or rivers flow”

Okay, I have already pointed out that the Nile river flows through the Eastern portion of the African continent (through Uganda, Ethiopia, Sudan, Burundi, and Egypt, to be precise), but I have a problem with the rest of this statement, too. The entire continent of Africa is not a desert! The African continent is home to many lush and tropical regions that are perfect for growing crops and trees. The eastern coast of Africa (including the island of Madagascar) is a tropical rain forest, while the average rainfall across the continent varies from 20 – 60 inches per year, which is similar to rainfall amounts in countries like the United States and the United Kingdom!

2. “Here’s to them underneath that burning sun”

The assumption that the entire continent of Africa is constantly under a “burning sun” is   just pure ignorance. I realize this song is about Ethiopia (which is never actually mentioned in the song), but does Band Aid realize that Ethiopia has three seasons, and that they are not “hot, hotter, and hottest”? Do they also know that the month of December (a.k.a. “Christmastime”) falls during the coolest season of the year in Ethiopia, with temperatures ranging from 16 degrees C/61 degrees F (in the highlands) to 28 degrees C/82 degrees F (in the lowlands)? This means that if you are toasting Ethiopians at Christmastime, they are quite comfortable, possibly even a little chilly, and not dehydrating under a burning sun.

1. “Well tonight that God it’s them, instead of you”.

This has to be the biggest “$%#&! you” in the history of music! What makes it worse is that Bono – yes, the humanitarian and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, that Bono – intones the words, advising us to take a moment as we celebrate in our “world of plenty” to be grateful that we are not among the starving and drought-ridden people of the never directly mentioned Ethiopia. Why not ask us to give from our plenty? That seems like the proper thing to ask…

Bono's cat, circa 1985?

I hope you have all enjoyed my Worst Christmas Song Ever Countdown! Feel free to add your own in the comments section below, on my Facebook page, or via Twitter, through the hashtag AskTazi or directly by tweeting @TaziKat.

Snuggles,

Tazi

Ask Tazi! is ghostwritten by a human with a Bachelors of Arts in Communications. Tazi-Kat is not really a talking feline.

Tazi's Corner Issue #10 - A Lesson On Lists

A few weeks ago one of my favorite blogs, People I Want To Punch In The Throat, published a blog on why people love lists. Not being a people, it took me a while to get around to reading this blog because, quite frankly, I am not fond of lists. Mommie’s seventh grade English professor* called lists fodder of the unimaginative; I tend to agree with him – with one major exception, as I will explain here. (*The man had a PhD, thus earning him the title Professor).

For the most part, lists have no continuity. Even David Lettermen’s famous Top 10 Lists offer no factual thesis statement around which an argument can be built; they are simply short nuggets of inaccurate humor that would create a non-sequiter if strung together in paragraph form. This lack of grammatical structure is thematic to the type of list that I hate because at best it does not require rhetorical talent to write one, at worst it makes everyone think that they can be a writer – if you want proof, check out the blogosphere and see what I mean.

Like reality TV, lists are easy to create and inexpensive to produce; this is why you often find lists on the Internet masquerading as articles. In short, lists are lazy. Regardless of what the topic – from Top 5 Ways To Blow His Mind in Bed to 16 Must Have Looks For Fall – the list in question will generally meet the following criteria:

1. It took very little (if any) research to write it. If the information on the list was not already in the writer’s mental vault of information it probably did not make the list.

2. There is often no follow-up information as to how or why a particular item made it onto the list. How do I know that dressing up a man’s genitals like an ice-cream sundae will blow his mind? Did someone do a controlled study on the subject? If so, where was it published?

3. There is no continuity from one item to the next. Did you notice how my first two items could have been put together into a paragraph, with the addition of segue and the elimination of the second item opening? Did you also notice that this thought came out of nowhere and is followed by something that should have been item #3 instead?

4. The explanatory paragraph following each item on the list will point out the obvious, if such a paragraph even exists at all.

5. The entire list will total some seemingly random number that is not random at all. The number of items on a list will generally be divisible by 5; be an even number; or be a “magical” number like 3 or 7, or even 13 (as in 13 Things You Didn’t Know About Friday the 13th!).

These types of lists – the bad lists – are essentially popcorn for the brain, fun to consume, but hardly nutritious food for thought; they take the extremes and present them as commonplace, as a form of entertainment to the masses – 5 Things You Should Never Put On Your Resume will include suggestions like “Hobbies” and “Family Life”, as if people regularly share this information. As an advice columnist I am guilty of sharing the extremes, but the bulk of the letters I print deal with issues that reach a broader audience (the extremes get printed when mail is slow and the pickings are slim).

Now that I have had my say on what makes a list a bad list, I ask that you read my thoughts on what makes a list a good list – this way I do not receive hate mail from list writers who think I am picking on them!

A good list will, ideally, be part of a larger article; a feature used to organize information that needs highlighting for the ease of the reader. I am not saying this because I do this; I do this because it makes for a stronger presentation of material. Features of a good list include:

1. A natural starting point in the article that features it. Even if the entire article is one big list, there should be an opening paragraph of introduction and a closing paragraph to finish the article. Opening and closing with random thoughts is the sign of a lazy writer and is disrespectful to readers. If someone is taking the time to read your work you should respect them enough to offer a complete piece...hint, hint syndicated, Pulitzer Prize winning columnist that I have emailed with this very complaint! Stop wasting your talent on such schlock!

2. Well-researched information. Writing is 90% research and 10% talent, and yes I just made up that statistic to show how convincing something can sound when you put a percentage symbol next to a number and state it with a sense of authority. A good list is not a part of the web of inaccuracies found on the Internet; a good list offers cited information or learned rhetoric.

3. Follow-up information after each item on the list. A few weeks ago, I published my personal list of 39 Must Read Modern (and Not So Modern) Classics. After each selection, I added the name of the author. This small piece of information might seem obvious, but the point is that a good list does not leave out vital, explanatory information.

4. Continuity and flow. For example, this list of 18 Rules for Raising a Boy starts with the most important rule of all, upon which most if not all will agree (“Teach him what a skank is so he'll never bring one home.), and works its way down to the less urgent rules where there is room for debate and dissent (“Teach him about good pizza”. Huh?).

5. A good list keeps the readers interest while accomplishing the goals of the writer. If, as a writer, your goal is to make people laugh you need to make certain that your audience can relate to the humor in your writing. I personally find the lists on Cracked.com floor-wettingly funny, and several times have had to make an emergency trip to the litter box when reading them; my Co-Mommie (Mommie’s Mommie) thinks they are dumb. Happily, Co-Mommie is not the target audience of Cracked.com.

In my research on writing and rhetoric, done over Mommie’s shoulder as she studies the topic for her latest degree, I have learned that people love lists for different reasons. Good lists are appreciated because they offer a focal point and a summary of important information. Bad lists are enjoyed because people have short attention spans and seek to be entertained while appearing intellectual – which, I am told, is why USA Today has such a large circulation. (Ooooh, a needless dig! Sorry, readers, but my heart belongs to The New York Post!).

Snuggles,
Tazi


Ask Tazi! is ghostwritten by a human with a Bachelors of Arts in Communications. Tazi-Kat is not really a talking feline.