Not Quite So New!
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"A rollicking ride of intellectual discovery and emotional growth... unlike his buzzer skills, his comic timing never fails"
-- The Wall Street Journal
"Pulls you in like a good sports story"
-- The New York Times Book Review
"Endearingly frank... jubilant... lighthearted and fast-paced"
-- New York Newsday
"A surprisingly touching memoir"
-- Entertainment Weekly
"Hugely funny"
-- Mental Floss
"Like Jeopardy! itself, it covers a lot of ground and in snappy and informative fashion"
-- Associated Press
"Down to earth and entertaining, even for non- Jeopardy! fans"
-- The New York Daily News
"A very funny writer... the book works like gangbusters."
-- Ken Jennings, 74-time Jeopardy! winner, holder of numerous other Jeopardy! records
"Effortlessly funny and informative... tender, human, and very wise... A must for anyone who loves Jeopardy!, or has ever seen it, or is breathing."
-- Joss Whedon, creator, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
"I haven't seen Jeopardy! since I was a kid, and yet I was charmed and amused by Bob Harris's fascinating and surprisingly suspenseful book. Through sheer force of personality, he takes this brainy TV show and makes it funny and easy to relate to."
-- Ira Glass, creator and host, This American Life
"Eccentric, energetic, and engaging"
-- Publishers Weekly
"The perfect gift for any Jeopardy! fan... I was thoroughly entertained"
-- USA Today, "Pop Candy"
"Surprisingly compelling... a funny and in-depth look at what it takes to win"
-- Long Island Press
"Wise, honest, and very funny... I wish I'd written it. Then again, I wish I'd won $127,000 and his-and-hers Camaros on Jeopardy!, too."
-- Jeff Greenstein, writer/producer, Desperate Housewives, Will & Grace, Friends
"Cleverly executed... solid entertainment"
-- Kirkus Reviews
"Answer: A hilarious, engaging and highly entertaining book. Question: What is Prisoner of Trebekistan? (All right... that was sort of a lame Jeopardy! joke. But what can I say? It's a great book.)"
-- Paul Feig, creator of Freaks and Geeks, author of Superstud and Kick Me
"A surprisingly intimate, entertaining book."
-- Orson Scott Card, author of Ender's Game
" Prisoner of Trebekistan is funny, enlightening -- and just might help you win a million bucks on Jeopardy!"
-- A. J. Jacobs, author of The Know-It-All
"If you don't buy this book -- this funny, learned, charming, and surprisingly moving book -- I will make it burst into flames in your hands."
-- Arthur Phillips, author of Prague and The Egyptologist
"A keeper for anyone who's even remotely a fan of Jeopardy!"
-- TVSquad.com
"If you enjoy... self-aware, geeky good humor, this could actually be your favorite book of the year."
-- The Stranger
"Highly entertaining... laugh-out-loud, absurdist funny... hilarious"
-- Akron Beacon-Journal
"Hilarious... a true treat for all Jeopardy! fans."
-- Strand Bookstore
"Everything you'd hope for... surprisingly compelling... deftly woven together... this sweet, fascinating book is a great read."
-- Book-blog.com
"If super-intelligent space aliens invaded our planet and demanded to interview one member of our species to ascertain whether or not we human beings were logical, bright, kind, and entertaining enough to be allowed to continue, I would nominate, with all my powers of persuasion, Bob Harris."
-- Emo Philips, comedian
"A masterful job of describing the feel of Jeopardy! in the heat of battle... I knew that Bob was a great guy and a fantastic Jeopardy! player. Now I've found that he's also a wonderful writer. I think I'm starting to hate him."
-- Brad Rutter, top money-winner in Jeopardy! history
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“Revelatory... wryly funny about some very serious subjects... Harris's sly wit and infectious curiosity make understanding world chaos fascinating... witty, horrific, and necessary.”
— Boston Globe
“Only Bob could make a user’s guide to our increasingly hostile world this absorbing, this breezy, and—ultimately—this hopeful.”
— Ken Jennings, author of Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs
"Brave... irreverent... charges into the thick of the globe's myriad simmering wars... hilariously relaxed."
— New York Observer
“Fascinating, enlightening, and surprisingly: NOT TOTALLY DEPRESSING. A gimlet-eyed look at the world we endure that’s also suitable for enjoying with a gimlet.”
— John Hodgman, author of The Areas of My Expertise
and correspondent for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
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Main
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Activism
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Monday, 05 November 2007 |
The WGA strike started at midnight Sunday. I've never been on strike before. This will be new.
In case you're curious and the news reports don't make the issues clear, the deal is extremely simple. Advancing technology is constantly changing the means through which the stuff we write is sold and delivered. Our deal doesn't cover those changes properly, and until it does, we'll get paid less and less fairly as time goes on.
As you know from your own experience, an ever-increasing percentage of the audience is seeing our work through DVDs, downloads, streaming media, and so on. Our last agreement dates to before YouTube and its ilk even existed.
Heck, nobody even knows how the audience will see stuff five or ten or fifty years from now. It might all be delivered wirelessly through the Internet, or to our phones, or to giant glowing mandatory probes inserted in the backs of our necks and jacked directly into our brain stems. (I only pray these will be designed by Apple. I mean, who wants a giant glowing mandatory neck probe made by Microsoft? Not me.)
One thing we do know, though: new media will be a large, growing, and possibly dominant part of the future. So WGA has to demand fair payment, or face literally signing away the writers' share of that future.
And while the studios will make money no matter how the work is distributed, our current deal simply doesn't extend properly into new media yet. So we're asking to get paid our fair share (and really nothing more than that, honest) for our work, no matter where it's shown.
That's it. That's the heart of the issue.
Basically, when they get paid for our work, we should get paid for our work -- whether it's in DVDs, downloads, or giant glowing mandatory neck probes.
Until then, sadly -- nobody wanted this -- pickets.
And hopefully some fairly creative slogans. Because, well, writers. Damn well better be.
PS: If you'd like more specifics, an excellent and clear issue-by-issue breakdown, along with the basic outlines of a possible agreement, are here. |
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Pudu
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Friday, 02 November 2007 |
We get a lot of questions about pudu maintenance. For example, some people's pudus wobble through corners at high speed.
So how often should a pudu's legs be rotated? Is it better to switch out the front pair with the back, or to rotate them four ways, like with a car?
Generally, you can just switch the front legs with the back legs and get improved mileage and stability. (Above, a pudu in mid-repair.)
With proper care, your pudu should be reliably tiny for many years to come.
Photo by an Argentine named Ricardo Cenzano, whose work I love looking at and who probably has a wonderful life.
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Prisoner of Trebekistan
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Wednesday, 31 October 2007 |
 Putting it plainiac, you'd be insaniac not to obtainiac. It's entertainiac.
Early next year -- just in time not to be just in time for the holidays, unfortunately -- Ken Jennings also has a new upcoming trivia almanac, in hardbac.
If you're a quiz-bowl type, the whole book is a cardstac.
Fun while eating hardtac in a guardshac.
I will stop now, before you complainiac.
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Prisoner of Trebekistan
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Tuesday, 30 October 2007 |
 While I'm thinking of Trebekistan today, a reminder:
Nineteen-game winner David Madden is still out there hiking the length of the entire east coast -- from Maine's border with Canada all the way to Key West -- while raising money for Fisher House, a top-rated non-profit that provides nearby lodging so that loved ones can be nearby while wounded military veterans undergo extended treatment for war-related injuries.
Last David checked in, he was strolling along a detour through Amish country. Sounds like an amazing trip. If you'd like to see what such a hike looks like, David's way-cool photo albums from the walk so far are here, here, and here.
Wherever we stand on the political spectrum, I hope this is something every American can support.
I hope you'll join me in chipping in, if you have one minute right now, plus a couple of dollars you'd like to share.
Thanks!
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Prisoner of Trebekistan
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Tuesday, 30 October 2007 |
If you've read Prisoner of Trebekistan, Lyn Payne is:
(a) the fellow contestant upon whose shoulder I put my head when I survived the first round of the 1998 Jeopardy! Tournament of Champions while suffering from a lousy fever,
(b) the fierce competitor who pushed me into the "Compleat Angler" Final Jeopardy moment in the semis,
(c) a real sweetheart, and
(d) going to be on Millionaire tomorrow (and possibly, I think, the next day if she does well).
I hope she won the whole giant kaboodle. Will be watching. Go Lyn!
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Economics
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Monday, 29 October 2007 |
 The Australian dollar sat around US $0.75 the last couple of times I was down there.
I peeked back over the summer, and it was sitting around US $0.83.
Today I glance down, and it's at US $0.92. That's a big move -- over 10 percent, just in the last few months.
If current trends continue (and thanks to enormous trade and budget deficits, they probably will), it may not be long before the Canadian dollar is joined by the Australian dollar in passing parity in its US exchange rate.
At least this one has kangaroos on it. Five of them, in fact. So, bouncy, at least.
Last year, Princeton economist and NY Times columnist Paul Krugman notably suggested that the dollar would eventually suffer a "Wile E. Coyote moment," when dollar holders would suddenly notice they'd long ago run over the cliff and hadn't had anything under their feet in some time.
Here's a recent amplification on that, including a brief look at theories as to what's keeping the coyote in the air, by one of Krugman's colleagues, the head of Europe's Centre for Economic Policy Research.
Yikes. Don't look down, I guess. |
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Media
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Sunday, 28 October 2007 |
Just came back from the live talking head gig on CNN's Reliable Sources, chatting about the wildfires. (Additional supporting links have been added below; scroll down or click here.)
Pretty much exactly what I expected: six or seven minutes of dearly wishing that every damn thing wasn't so frequently framed as partisan, and wishing I wasn't contributing to it.
As I said (or tried to, anyway) on the show, science itself should be in no way partisan, and both Republican and Democratic lives and livelihoods will all clearly be in greater danger for years to come. This should never have been framed this way. Maybe if I'd been asked on in some other format or framework. I dunno. But man, nobody giving aid and shelter and food down at Qualcomm this week asked for party affiliation. Democratic and Republican firefighters work together side by side without a thought. Politicizing a huge and growing future problem this way so debases our ability to solve it together.
But how do you plead for bipartisanship when (a) you're already tagged before you speak as being the lefty voice, and (b) the current administration, which is Republican, is actively censoring science? Just pointing out objective reality looks partisan in that context.
Still, I went on because the science on climate change and its relation to wildfires is much clearer than I think most of the media has reported (see some of the links below for starters), and I wanted to get the information out there. Southern California is my home. I care about this greatly.
I don't naturally like to talk over people or be talked over, but the format almost demands it. The time limitations force you into this weird haiku of talking points, pushing each side to try to score points rather than just talk. Plus, even in normal conversation people often need a couple of shots at getting what they mean into words, so in this compressed environment, someone will almost inevitably say something inaccurate. (I know I did at least once, not meaning to.) So I suddenly found myself talking over the other guest a couple of times even though I was trying not to, and probably vice versa. And amid the babble I have no idea if anyone gained any useful information. I kinda doubt it.
Frankly, that there are people who actually enjoy this process baffles me. I have no idea what sort of emotional worlds professional pundits must inhabit. But I don't think I've ever even visited.
I'm also saddened to notice that even people on "my" side of things were evaluating the appearance not just in terms of how much information I got out, but also in how I looked to them in comparison to the other guest, which is so dearly not the real point. (btw, I'm sure she's quite bright, kind, and good-willed. Sincerely, I mean that. Most people are pretty wonderful, given a chance. Not fully grokking the various ecosystems in California and how they are managed differently is perfectly understandable. At a party, we probably would have had a great time, disagreed, chatted amiably, found common ground, and moved on. Instead, I kinda had to confront her in a way that would be rude in any other context, and I feel lousy about it. This does not come naturally to me.)
What I regret not saying most of all: that those chairs should be filled with real scientists and experts with direct knowledge and experience, not bloggers, including me, for gods' sake.
Then again, TV is a business, and they have airtime to fill. Y'know, it never really occurred to me before how much the 24/7 news cycle may itself have contributed to the fracturing of America and this tragic partisanship now so pervasive that it's frequently mistaken for patriotism on both sides. (I'm guilty of that myself a hundred times over, btw.)
Our visual window on world events is constantly being filled with this left/right thing, imposed even when it doesn't belong. It's great, inexpensive, entertaining TV. But we now have an entire generation of people who don't even remember a time when extreme partisanship wasn't a frequently televised, culturally acceptable, mainstreamed part of our discourse.
How we ever turn back from this I have no idea. |
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Site updates
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Sunday, 28 October 2007 |
No idea what's going to come up exactly on CNN this morning, but for viewers who bop over here after, these might be useful links:
Gotta run. If something else comes up -- which it probably will -- and I should post a link, I'll do it within a couple of hours of the show.
Thanks for stopping by.
(Added later:)
SF Chronicle: State National Guard Warns It's Stretched to the Limit (Head of California National Guard says in May that needed equipment is in Iraq, elsewhere, or unfunded; in the same article, Gov. Schwarzenegger concurs that "equipment has gone to Iraq, and it doesn't come back") USA Today survey of National Guard equipment as of four months ago (California was rated at "50%" and reported to be short 800 Humvees, 700 tactical vehicles, and 50 heavy lifter trucks, although the spokesman maintained the state was still prepared) Map of and photos of California chaparral (notice the distinct difference between chaparral and, for example, pine forest) LA County Fire Dept. page on chaparral management (local ongoing activity simply not appealed by environmentalists) United States Geological Survey brief (explains that in chaparral and coastal scrub, "catastrophic wildfires are not the result of unnatural fuel accumulation," limiting the value of prescription burning anyway) LA Times: Forest Thinning Helps Spare Some Homes (true enough -- but note that the area under discussion is Lake Arrowhead, whose 5100-ft. altitude is more comparable to Denver than San Diego, with a markedly different ecosystem including large stands of resin-laden pine, requiring different management) Press-Enterprise: Speed Forest Thinning to Ease Fire Threat, Experts Say (again, the discussion here concerns Big Bear, a pine-rich mountain area at 6700 feet; the story explicitly links wildfires and the buildup of dead-tree fuel in part to climate change, beginning with "the nation's worsening fire seasons are, in part, a consequence of global warming...") |
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Media
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Friday, 26 October 2007 |
OK, this is weird: I've been invited to appear this Sunday on CNN's "Reliable Sources" to talk about the California wildfires.
I'm no expert (obviously) and have never pretended to be, so I'm not sure if this is even worth watching. But there it is. I've been paired up with a conservative blogger, so simply because of the format alone, I'm not expecting much in the way of actual conversation. Most of these left-right talking-head things really nothing more than competitive evangelism, where two sides try to sell their talking points over each other in a very limited period of time. I can't stand that sort of rubbish, I don't intend to participate in it, and I told the producer so. Surprised she still invited me. Either this will be surprisingly cool or the English language has its limits.
What rarely gets pointed out about the conventional talking head left-right format, although it should be self-evident: whoever may be correct in a given discussion, left or right, the severe time limitations also virtually ensure equal time for someone to spew complete crap -- unless either the moderator is hip and brave enough to call shenanigans (rare), or both participants approach it with open minds and intellectual honesty (rarer still). Most of what I've seen, nobody goes away learning a damn thing, and at least some absolute falsehoods get declared with sincerity and stand without rebuttal at the end. Then we wonder why large chunks of the electorate are confused on the most basic facts of entire wars.
So I accept the invitation with severe reservations. Frankly, I don't care what I think about the wildfires, much less what any blogger or pundit or news commentator might think. I have no desire to hit a bunch of talking points under fire like I'm back doing stand-up and I've got to get to the killer bit in the four minutes before the commercial. It's just not interesting. I care about what actual scientists think, with time and perspective and research and peer review.
Unfortunately, CNN doesn't have a Rolodex entry for the League of Attractive Scientists. (I asked the producer. Really. She laughed, and I bet if someone organized such a group, she'd put them on in a second.)
So it'll be me, balding white guy, and some right-leaning woman -- who I assume is much younger and more attractive than I am, this being commercial TV -- talking about things (a) other people really know about, some of which (b) we've read. What great purpose this serves, I'm honestly not sure. Also, we'll chat about what we think about what we saw in the media this week. Eight minutes later, HeadOn, apply directly to the forehead! for you guys, a trip back home to sleep for me. Such a refreshing change from every other damn thing on the tube.
I'm not even sure why I'm doing this, other than I tend not to say no to new experiences. (This is why I'm about to spend time in England, Northern Ireland, Mexico, probably much of South America, and possibly Tanzania in the next six months. And then probably moving to Australia. Saying yes to unexpected things makes life fizzy. Highly recommended.)
Ten years ago, I probably would have been excited, mistakenly seeing this as validating, even an opportunity, when it's just the gaping empty maw of 24/7 media seeking perpetual nourishment. Now I just hope to have one useful conversation with bright, friendly people and go home. Is that asking too much? I'm curious.
We'll see how it goes. I can only hold up my end. I guess the point I'd like to make going in, on this show about media coverage of major issues: until we figure out how to have more actual, um, experts on TV regularly discussing the many underlying causes of the fires (or whatever the latest disaster to come may be) -- dispassionately, and without a partisan agenda -- we haven't even begun to solve anything. (Implementing any changes would be a whole other magilla.) Not bloody damn likely, I know.
But until then, as a nation, we're smoking in bed, and then wondering why we keep waking up on fire.
I may also sneak in a polite word about the limitations of shoehorning every damn issue into this manichean up/down left/right ongoing ceremonial argument machine. I know they sort of have to, now that we've been so well polarized that they'll get accusations of bias if they do almost anything else. But still. (This wouldn't be ambushing the host; I told the producer exactly how I feel about this, and she said she was cool with it.)
If the thing turns into a partisan deal, well, I'm cramming almost as if it's another Jeopardy! call, just in case. Who does "better" in that exchange is probably up to Howie more than anything else. But I really hope it's civil and involves some actual thinking.
One positive idea, maybe: has anybody ever suggested a reward-the-good-guys, inverted version of a media boycott -- buying extra crap when somebody actually does some great broadcasting?
I mean, if CNN went out and got the leading environmental scientists, urban planners, and fire experts -- not partisan hacks, not talk radio hosts, not elected politicians, and not me and some other blogger, for gods' sake -- to sit not for eight minutes but for a three-night in-depth roundtable moderated by a non-partisan scientist who hasn't registered with either major party because he's too busy solving actual problems... I would buy every single goddam thing they advertised.
I would buy the HeadOn. I would buy crates of the stuff. I would apply it directly to my forehead. Maybe a million other people would, too.
Ah, impossible dreams. But for now, we go to media with the shows we have.
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Environment
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Friday, 26 October 2007 |
How low can things go?
The U.S. government's main disaster-response agency apologized on Friday for having its employees pose as reporters in a hastily called news conference on California's wildfires...
No real reporters were allowed in, although they were allowed to listen.
Those responsible, however, may be "reprimanded." Nice to know that people who have this much disrespect for the public and the democratic process in the middle of a crisis affecting hundreds of thousands of lives will at least get a good stern talking-to.
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Sport
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Wednesday, 24 October 2007 |
 For those who came in late or don't follow baseball (in which case you may just decide to scroll down to the next post), the Indians came within one game of reaching the World Series this year... and then lost three straight, setting a new record for striking out in an AL championship series.
This matches nicely with the Cleveland Browns getting to within one game of the Super Bowl... and then losing spectacularly in the very last seconds. Twice. Or Ohio State getting to the national championship game in both football and basketball last year... and then getting killed. Or the Cleveland Cavaliers getting to the NBA Finals for the first time, then losing four straight while setting a record for the fewest points scored in a modern NBA Finals series.
I say this with no small admiration for the diehards back home: if you c | |
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