Archive: Arts & Entertainment

Smart Talk SMART TALK
By  Dr. Verbos Metikulos

PRONE: At the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired, my colleague Dr. Clark Chousie collects what he likes to call delicious distinctions. He’s something of a mandarin about precise usage, but I enjoy the language debates he sets off in the Fowler Lounge.

For instance, a potential victim of Dr. Chousie may think prone describes any horizontal position. Wrong. He would say, with one raised eyebrow, dead wrong. Prone is lying face down; supine, lying face up. Someone else may learn that contiguous means connected at the sides; conterminous, connected at the ends. The good doctor derives delight from this. Everybody needs a hobby.

People get caught most often saying something like, “You have two choices, A or B.” Dr. Metikulos calmly, and maddeningly, replies, “No, I have one choice. You gave me two options.” A choice is an act of choosing from options, he explains. If you have two choices, you will choose two from among three or more options.

Though he makes these corrections completely without malice, those corrected are prone to avoid the poor man thereafter.

----
v2i28

----
v2i27

Smart Talk SMART TALK
By Nurse Saber S. Poder

PRECONDITION: This strange word is often in the news. For instance, our exalted leaders love to have talks about preconditions for having talks. At the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired, we consider this to be a symptom of Temporal Retentive Syndrome. Sufferers also say prerequisite, and they plan ahead.

A condition is a requisite, a stipulation of what will occur before something else can happen. Saying precondition is as fatuous as saying prereservation.

You can see why we treat politicians. You can see why we’re in Texas.

----
v2i27

The thing is, you  don't have really high expectations.  After all, what can kids accomplish in only five days?  But then the lights dim in the auditorium and come up on the stage and the flute ensemble starts playing a scherzo.  Your eyes snap to the stage -- are these really kids?  The quality of the playing, the ensemble and music -- this is really good!  And the rest of last Friday's 2006 Band Camp Concert didn't disappoint.

SMART TALK SMART TALK
By Dr. Parley Speake

POSTPONED UNTIL A LATER DATE: Underbelly, Texas, got a freak snowstorm one night in February. Roads soon became impassable due to three inches of snow and deep drifts of bald-tired pickup trucks. KBUL, the Voice of Bedspring Tech in nearby Los Libidos, announced the closing of Lengua Loco County schools.

At the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired, we were glad to hear that Holy Mother of Retribution’s confirmation class was postponed until a later date. As was the same class at Our Lady of Loving Disapproval in Underbelly.

Those of us who could get to work at the Institute sardonically agreed that a later date was probably a good idea. Postponed until an earlier date might have caused problems, right?

“Yes, in the temporal lobe,” said Nurse Sotto Voce.

----
v2i26

June 30, 2006 (ITHACA, NY)- Judy Blume’s classic story of sibling rivalry hits the Hangar Stage for one day only. On Saturday, July 8th, the Hangar Theatre’s KIDDSTUFF season continues with Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing. Performed at 10 am and Noon, Tales presents the tragicomic saga of Peter Hatcher, older brother of three-year-old terror, Fudge. Because he's the oldest, Peter must deal with his little brother Fudgie's disgusting cuteness, his constant meddling with Peter's stuff, and other grave offenses, one of which is almost too much to bear.

----
v2i26

The weather disappointed, but the music didn't as fans braved the rain to hear the Burns Sisters perform in Myers Park last Thursday (6/29).  The singers were there to kick off Lansing Park Department's Music in the Park series.  Cars lined the central park area like box seats in a theater, but people on the lawn simply put up umbrellas when it rained while the band  performed.

SMART TALK SMART TALK
By  Dr. Will S. Sert



PREREQUISITE: It wasn’t my idea to write this column, but I’m a senior member of the staff at the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired, and I’m retiring soon. Then I won’t have to listen to the howls of campus officials who are never wrong.

You know the type: “This catalogue was composed by Dr. Smythe and myself,” they say, “and Dr. Smythe is a trained expert.” Of course, you know that the dean of admissions should have said, “by Dr. Smythe and me,” and “expert,” but I digress.

After heated discussion in Strunk Hall, my Board of Directors says I must tell the waiting world that prerequisite is as redundant as prerecorded, and every college catalog looks foolish. Every course has requisites. There.

ITHACA, NY: This summer, the Kitchen Theatre Company (KTC) will complete its 2005/06 - 15th Anniversary MAIN STAGE Season with a world premiere. From the writing team that brought you the hit Tony & the Soprano comes a romantic new musical. The Angle of the Sun, by Rachel Lampert and Larry Pressgrove, is a sassy, sexy, two-person musical comedy-drama about a woman's journey through a roller coaster of romantic entanglements and love.

KTC newcomer Lindsey Alley (see bio below) plays poet and painter, Jan Frankel. Jan loves to be at one with nature, painting the landscape, and delighting in the changes in light as the sun crosses the sky each day. She intends to capture it all-not only in her art, but also in love and in life. Her relationships cover lots of territory-great, disastrous, sexy, and platonic-but, well, never "just right."