Jeffrey L Cohen

I supported Clinton when he was in office, but never quite was a FOB (Friend of Bill). There was always a little too much slickness, or calculatedness, turning on and off his Southern drawl depending on the situation.

This morning on NPR, he was interviewed about the potential changes Congress is debating regarding terrorist prisoners, torture and the Geneva convention. After hearing the interview, I had two thoughts: Clinton is a thoughtful, intelligent politician, and Bush is a total idiot.

Clinton’s main point was that there is no need to address broad sweeping changes to the Geneva convention for a small sub-set of possibilities, when those possibilities can be addressed on a case-by-case basis. For example, a known terrorist with known information can be coerced to get information, and permission to do it can be applied for afterwards. This seems completely logical to me. Plus no one will really question the process if it yields results.

Peter’s football team won a squeaker today against the Durham Firebirds. This was a tremendous improvement over last week’s game where they were shut out.

The Firebirds came out with some trick plays and scored a quick touchdown. The Falcons responded with a touchdown of their own making it 6-6. More trick plays from the Firebirds made it 12-6 in the first quarter. The Falcons scored again before halftime making 12-12 at the break.

The second half was nearly scoreless. In the fourth quarter the Falcons drove down the field, but lost the ball near the end zone. The Firebirds struggled to move the ball from deep in their end of the field. On what should have been the last play of regulation, the Firebirds quarterback pitched the ball to nobody and the ball rolled into the end zone. A Firebirds player dove onto the ball, and it was a safety, adding two points to the Falcons score. The Falcons had the lead.

The Firebirds tried an on-sides kick, but failed to recover it. The Falcons lined up for one final play, but the clock ran down. Falcons 14 Firebirds 12.

Falcons raise their helmets in victory

One thing to note about the game: I was part of the chain gang working the first down sticks. I had a great view of the action, but Peter was mainly on the opposite from me.

When I was growing up in 70s and 80s, I loved Pepperidge Farm Milano cookies. They were the perfect mix of cookie and rich, dark chocolate. There were about six or eight other chocolate filled Pepperidge Farm cookies at the time, things like Brussels and Tahoe, but Milano were the best.

I lost touch with Milanos in high school, but rediscovered Mint Milanos in college. They had managed to take a perfect cookie and improve it by added the cool, smooth mint. We could buy these fantastic cookies on meal points, and boy did I buy a lot of them. Combined with 11:00 pm steak and chesse heroes and milkshakes, they did their part to support the Freshman 15.

Much time has passed, in fact I just got an invitation to my 20th college reunion coming up this Spring, and I have lost touch with one of my favorite childhood cookies. I have other favorite cookies that have other associations, but that’s another story for another day. Anyway, I was in the grocery store and noticed something called Black and White Milanos. These have one chocolate cookie and one white cookie. I managed walk on by these cookies, but it seemed like a good time to look up the varieties of Milanos.

According to Pepperidge Farm website, there are currently nine varieties:
Milano
Double Chocolate Milano
Milk Chocolate Milano
Mint Milano
Raspberry Milano
Orange Milano
French Vanilla Milano
Black & White Milano
Amaretto Milano

Plus Mini Mint Milanos

It seems that over the years, this perfect cookie has become gentrified and has grown up with its lovers. No self-respecting kid would ever ask for Amaretto or French Vanilla Milanos. I don’t think I would either. I would stick to the traditional or Mint flavors only, and leave it at that. These are not cookies to fan out while entertaining. They are just cookies. But good ones.

One of the best things about having a large (30GB) iPod is the ability to load box sets onto it. A couple of the collections I have are the Motown Set (4 disks) and the Police Box Sets (every released recording on 4 disks). But there is one box set that appears to be my iPod’s favorite: Velvet Underground. I have 4 of the 5 disks on my iPod, and I think almost every time I listen in Shuffle mode, a Velvet Underground song comes up.

I know you shouldn’t mess with the karma of the iPod and click to the next song, but sometimes I do.

From the NY Times:

THE familiar tokens from the Monopoly board game are getting a modern — and, some might say, mercenary — makeover.

An updated edition of the venerable game, scheduled to be introduced on Thursday, will include tokens that are styled after name-brand products. Five of the eight tokens in the new Monopoly Here and Now edition will be branded, offering game players the chance to be represented by miniature versions of a Toyota Prius hybrid car, an order of McDonald’s French fries, a New Balance running shoe, a cup of Starbucks coffee or a Motorola Razr cellphone.

Today Peter participated in the local Punt, Pass & Kick competition. It was a fun and informal gathering for him and several of his sports-minded friends. He was one of 3 kids from his football team competing in the 8-9 Boys division.

He made a good attempt, but did not place in the competition. He had fun and got an official NFL certificate with all the team football helmets.

Peter had his first football game today. As he described it to a friend, “We got creamed 25-0.” This will be a very different year than last year. Peter has been playing back-up quarterback in practice, but did not take a snap during the game.

He only played on defense, mainly linebacker. He forced a fumble on one play.

As the coach said, this game points out what they need to work on.

Grace and I played a tough game of Pretty, Pretty Princess. It was neck and neck down the stretch. I had all my jewelry, plus the crown, but I couldn’t win until I got rid of the black ring. All she needed was the crown. She beat me to it, got the crown and to the victor went the spoils.

Last night I removed a light bulb from Grace’s light. It is a small fan light bulb, but that fits in a full size socket. It is the only use of this light bulb in the house, so we obviously don’t have another one. When we moved into this house, every light fixture had unique bulbs, which we have strived to standardize.

Anyway, I came downstairs holding the lightbulb and I laid down on the couch. I wound up falling asleep, tightly clutching the lightbulb. I woke up with my fingers stiff and wondering what I was holding and why I was holding it so tightly.

Meg said she wanted to get a tattoo. When I asked her what kind of tattoo, she said there’s a woman who has written a short story and it is being tattooed on volunteers one word at a time. She started a couple of years, but is not yet complete. If she would read all her email, she has enough volunteers, but she also said a new email might slide in ahead of others if she happens to read it.

The woman’s name is Shelley Jackson and here is her web site. The name of the story is Skin. I was interested because I went to high school with Shelley Jackson and it is possible that it was the same one.

This Shelley Jackson:

was extracted from the bum leg of a water buffalo in 1963 in the Philippines and grew up complaining in Berkeley, California. Bravely overcoming a chronic pain in her phantom limb, she extracted an AB in art from Stanford and an MFA in creative writing from Brown.