Blockbuster's Future, A Guest Story

Despite my warnings, my wife recently visited Blockbuster. This is her story:

Her: (After picking up the last disc of Mad Men season 4, she walked up to line. A couple minutes go by.)

Another customer: Why are there 4 employees and only 1 register open? Why you make us all wait like that?

Employees: Sorry sorry sorry (as 1 more register was opened and the old crotchety man was helped. But then that new register was closed once he was helped. Eventually my wife got to the front of the line with cash in hand.)

Employee: Oh your paying with cash. We'll have to go to another register. (They move to another register.)

Employee: Is this Blockbuster card new?

Her: No. It's pretty old. I got it when I lived in Clemson.

Employee: Oh, the nationwide system can't read this.

Her: Can I give you a phone number?

Employee: We don't do that anymore. Do you have card for your license number?

Her: I don't know. I just want to rent this.

Employee: Well let's try that (she tries to run her licence number). Nope that doesn't work. Would like to fill out the paperwork for a new card?

Her: I already have a card. I just want to rent this.

Employee: Well let's try that card again. Oh here it is! But this says it's for Harrison Brookie?

Her: Yes he's my husband. I can call and get his licence number.

Employee: No, it has to be you.

Her: [sigh] I just want to rent this...

Employee: Okay (somehow her card magically works now).

Economic Strategy to Fight Protesters

I've always been skeptical of the benefits of protesting as a way to shout your vote. The infamous Westboro Baptist Church, as I've shared before, is a great example of protest gone bad. This may be the best strategy to get rid of them:

Comedy’s Lovable Queen of Mean Lisa Lampanelli made good on her promise to donate $1,000 to the Gay Men’s Health Crisis for every Westboro Baptist Church member who showed up to protest her recent stand-up show in Topeka, taking to Twitter after the show to say “Thanks to these a-holes, $44,000 will be donated to the GMHC!!!” 

She later bumped it up by $6k, tweeting “WBC inbreds counted 48 protesters, so I won’t quibble. I’ll make it an even $50,000!!!” 

Best part? The donation will be made in the hate group’s name. Thanks WBC!

Apparently this strategy has also worked for Planned Parenthood.

How to Tie Your Shoes

Maybe the most practical TED Talk I've ever listened to.



I've since changed the way I tie my shoes.

Brookie Dictionary: Complaintment

com-plaint-ment [kəm-ˈplānt-mənt] (n) - an expression of respect, affection, or admiration; which also contains an expression of grief, pain, or dissatisfaction

Example: "Thanks for doing the dishes, you haven't done that in a long time!"


Here's my first Brookie Dictionary word, Treason.

Benign Violation Theory of Humor

Similar to my earlier reality and absurdity post on comedy, professor of psychology Peter McGraw has his own theory:

Their paper, “Benign Violations: Making Immoral Behavior Funny,” cited scores of philosophers, psychologists, and neuroscientists (as well as Mel Brooks and Carol Burnett). The theory they lay out: “Laughter and amusement result from violations that are simultaneously seen as benign.” That is, they perceive a violation—”of personal dignity (e.g., slapstick, physical deformities), linguistic norms (e.g., unusual accents, malapropisms), social norms (e.g., eating from a sterile bedpan, strange behaviors), and even moral norms (e.g., bestiality, disrespectful behaviors)”—while simultaneously recognizing that the violation doesn’t pose a threat to them or their worldview. The theory is ludicrously, vaporously simple. But extensive field tests revealed nuances, variables that determined exactly how funny a joke was perceived to be.

Here it is in diagram form:

Here's the social explanation:

The ultimate takeaway of McGraw’s paper was that the evolutionary purpose of laughter and amusement is to “signal to the world that a violation is indeed OK.” Building on the work of behavioral neurologist V. S. Ramachandran, McGraw believes that laughter developed as an instinctual way to signal that a threat is actually a false alarm—say, that a rustle in the bushes is the wind, not a saber-toothed tiger. “Organisms that could separate benign violations from real threats benefited greatly,” McGraw says.

Here's how you make a moral violation benign:

Dirty jokes violate social norms in a benign way because the traveling salesmen and farmers’ daughters that populate them are not real. Punch lines make people laugh because they gently violate the expectations that the jokes set up. The BVT also explains Sarah Silverman, McGraw says; the appalling things that come out of her mouth register as benign because she seems so oblivious to their offensiveness, and “because she’s so darn cute.” Even tickling, long a stumbling block for humor theorists, appears to fit. Tickling yourself can’t be a violation, because you can’t take yourself by surprise. Being tickled by a stranger in a trench coat isn’t benign; it’s creepy. Only tickling by someone you know and trust can be a benign violation.

If you want to hear more from Mr. McGraw's own words, here's his TED Talk:

Difference Between Reality and Absurdity is Comedy

One of the benefits of teaching both adult improv classes (next starting May 16th) classes and children's improv camps (next starting June 20th) is seeing the strengths and weaknesses in both. The obvious difference is in energy. Kids can literally do improv games for 4 hours, run around for an hour at lunch, and be ready for another 4 hours afterward. It's tough to get a solid 3 hours of physical and mental effort out of adults. But below that difference is something deeper.

In a recent NPR story on what makes something funny, improviser Neil Casey from the renowned Death by Roo Roo discusses how patterns, what improvisers call "game", makes us laugh. But what kind of repeated patterns does our brain not only follow, but find amusing? The unexpected reality.

Children love to do absurd scenes. Give them the suggestion of kitchen and they'll be astronauts on sun trying to stop a bacon attack. Give that same suggestion to adults and they'll argue about whether there is too much flour in the cake. Adults love to do boring, often argumentative scenes. They like to play themselves. Where as kids like to play any but. Somewhere in the middle lies the ideal.

The title of this post is a quote from Bill Arnett, the director of the training center at Chicago's most famous improv theater, iO. In every scene we should establish a basic reality, but within that reality there should be a little absurdity. By my own calculation you need 99% real with 1% absurd. It isn't about astronauts fighting bacon. Or adults arguing about flour. But it can't be about married astronauts arguing about who's going to cook breakfast. A normal couple having a normal fight, just in space.

Here's an article the neuroscience behind it. Our brain is always trying to make sense about the present and the future. When those predictions are simultaneously affirmed and surprised, you have comedy. I know what an argument with my wife is like. Check. I don't know what space is like. Check. Let the comedy begin (tonight).

CIA's 'Facebook' Program

Comedy Makes You More Attractive

For men at least:

Producing humor might function as a fitness indicator associated with greater desirability during dating selection. A male confederate in a bar was instructed to tell (or not tell) funny jokes to two other male confederates. A few minutes later, when the second of two male confederates left, the first male confederate asked a female who was near his table and who had heard the funny jokes for her phone number. The previous expression of humor was associated with greater compliance with the male confederate's request and with a higher positive evaluation.

And don't forget, doing improv also makes you smarter, happier, friendlier, supportive, adventurous, and more able to learn.

The Almond: Activists Want God Taken Out of Foul Language

A couple of years ago I posted an article that I submitted and got accepted in the satirical Christian news site, LarkNews.com. That wasn't my first experience with online satirical writing. In college, I helped to create and even ran the no longer existent Clemson fake news source, TheAlmond.com. Here's the ClemsonWiki article on it:

The Almond was a satirical news website written by Clemson University students and inspired by the satirical magazine The Onion [1]. The Almond was founded in the Spring of 2005, with the first online issue appearing on February 28th, 2005 [2]. The website was written and edited pseudo-anonymously under pen names, and anyone was free to submit articles to the site through an e-mail submission feature. Briefly, in the Fall of 2005, articles from The Almond appeared in some issues of The Tiger, in the TimeOut section. The Almond was also an official Clemson University student organization. 

Summer of 2007: The Almond was shut down following a cease-and-desist letter from the Onion. The main writers of The Almond created a new site in blog format at TheNewsMen.com. By September 2008, this domain name had expired.

This walk down nostalgia lane was courtesy of me coming across an article I originally wrote for the site that was later published in Clemson's student newspaper in 2005. Seems like only yesterday when I first giggled at my own idea:

Activists Want God Taken Out of Foul Language, by Jim Harris 

MIDDLE SCHOOL, CLEMSON - With the apparent outspokenness of the current presidential administration on the topic of religion, it is not surprising to see the opposing side speaking out as well. The legality of God in the Pledge of Allegiance and the 10 Commandments in public schools have become major issues of the times.

Now, even Clemson has been asked to take drastic measures to keep religion out of its doors. Local activist group AmeriCa's Right Of No Youth Ministers (ACRONYM) has confronted Clemson Middle School with the issue of young children using the word "God" in their foul language.

"I just want my children to be able to curse in the name of whomever they want," said Bob Springer, a member of ACRONYM.

When contacted Saturday for a statement, the school did not answer and was apparently not ready to reply.

ACRONYM was formed in 1996 to combat the growing number of children attending church youth groups.

"We formed picket lines of tolerance around local churches to keep our children's minds open to all voices and opinions," said Kathryn Sullivan, president of

ACRONYM. "Living in the Bible Belt can be tough, especially when people only surround themselves with others who believe similar things. ACRONYM is just a group of people who agree that this is wrong."

These activists not only blame the local church but also the media.

"We have seen the continuous collaboration between the church and conservative media for decades," said Springer. "I know my son didn't learn to curse in the name of God from me! Shows that are secretly funded by the Republican Party, like 'South Park' and 'The Osbournes,' are teaching my children ludicrous conservative values when they instruct my children that 'GD' is a 'hip' way to cuss. With this growing epidemic of religious cursing, fearful parents should be offering their children healthy, helpful secular alternatives."

ACRONYM's main legal argument is based on Thomas Jefferson's famous speech in which he quoted the Constitutional phrase describing America's "separation of church and state." Researchers are currently still searching for this line in Constitution.

"We know we are right to not let people force their beliefs on everyone else, but I just wish we could make everyone understand that!" said vice-president John Young.

Until the reluctant school is contacted to see what they are willing to do about the situation, it seems that these activists will just have to wait. ACRONYM has apparently committed itself to calling Clemson Middle School every Saturday until their phone calls are answered.

"They can't ignore us forever! Those Dalai-Lama-darn people will listen to open-mindedness whether they want to or not," said Young.

A rally to gain Clemson University student support is being held at the local Ben and Jerry's this Friday at 1 p.m.

My favorite part about this article was overhearing someone in one of my classes, who apparently didn't realize it was fake, say that he went down to Ben and Jerry's to see if anyone showed up. No one did.

To see the other handful of articles published in the student newspaper go here.

Pound for Pound Presents A Two Person Show

I've posted variety type show from college and recent group Harold performances. Here's a duo team I proud to be a part of. I apologize in advance for the video quality:

Famous as Shit

I've thought a lot about fame. About what it's like to be really famous and kind of famous. And how to know if you are famous. In the past, my fame-meter has been do you want to have lunch with a stranger. A truly famous person couldn't say yes, if they did, they'd always be eating with strangers. Justin Wehr has come up with an even more unusual metric. In response to poop art:

It is fascinating (to me) to think about the different market values of poop depending on context. The same person who paid thousands of dollars for Manzoni's poop would probably pay hundreds of dollars to avoid the experience of seeing, smelling, or God-forbid stepping in a stranger's poop.

Here is a fascinating question: What person, in what context, would have the highest-valued poop?

I'd bet that a Buzz Aldrin turd released in space would demand a pretty penny. Not sure if it would go higher than a Marilyn Monroe turd.
You heard it here first: If I ever become famous enough to have poop with a positive market value (come to think of it, that is a good measure of fame, isn't it?), I will sell it. In fact, I wouldn't mind being remembered as the guy who sold more of his poop than any other human in history. I am only half-joking.

That's a part of Justin's weird but surprisingly interesting series Poop Mondays. Here are the other posts so far:

• Pooping Shamefully
• How to poop: The proper posture
• The world before [and after] toilet paper
• Bathroom behavior
• Branding and Poop

Here's my contribution to the topic: flushtracker.com.

Kid Lincoln Presents Harold

You've seen me do it, now see the team I coach:

Argument Against Drug Legalization

You know where I stand. But some disagree:

I couldn't have gotten so stinking rich without George Bush, George Bush Jr., Ronald Reagan, even El Presidente Obama, none of them have the cajones to stand up to all the big money that wants to keep this stuff illegal. From the bottom of my heart, I want to say, Gracias amigos, I owe my whole empire to you.

That's apparently from billion drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman Loera.

Learning Hard or Hardly Learning

From a recent paper about learning:

Previous research has shown that disfluency – the subjective experience of difficulty associated with cognitive operations – leads to deeper processing.

And here's the study:

Study 1 found that information in hard-to-read fonts was better remembered than easier to read information in a controlled laboratory setting.

Hat tip to the Frontal Cortex.

Young Siblings, Old Siblings

The Brookies in '01

The Brookies in '10

Inspired by Young Me, Now Me.

Uncompensated Holiday Unemployment

Here's a quote NPR's Marketplace last week in a story about academic sabbatical:

From the outside, the professor-ly life might seem pretty cushy. Summers off, the job security of tenure, a paid leave every six years or so to do research.

And here's a letter written in response:

Michael Harris wrote from Fairbanks, Ala., and his post at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, to challenge the notion of professors getting summers off. Academics are on nine-month contracts, Professor Harris writes. "This is not actually time off, but rather annual uncompensated unemployment with the obligation to return to their faculty positions in the following term."

With today and tomorrow canceled for snow, I guess my forced leave begins early. Oh the challenges of educating the youth of America.

Comedy Makes You Smarter and Happier

I've posted before on the benefits of improv in thinking faster, idea support, and building friendship. Here's a benefit of simply watching comedy, it makes you smarter, instantly:

In a just completed study, researchers at Northwestern University found that people were more likely to solve word puzzles with sudden insight when they were amused, having just seen a short comedy routine.

“What we think is happening,” said Mark Beeman, a neuroscientist who conducted the study with Karuna Subramaniam, a graduate student, “is that the humor, this positive mood, is lowering the brain’s threshold for detecting weaker or more remote connections” to solve puzzles.

Humor can also help improve your mood:

This study aimed to demonstrate that the cognitive demands involved in humor processing can attenuate negative emotions. A primary aspect of humor is that it poses cognitive demands needed for incongruency resolution. On the basis of findings that cognitive distraction prevents mood-congruent processing, the authors hypothesized that humorous stimuli attenuate negative emotions to a greater extent than do equally positive nonhumorous stimuli.

Here's the Wikipedia article on the positive psychology of humor.

Collusion in the Classroom

Recently due to a field trip, my AP Microeconomics class was cut down to just a handful. So instead of treading forward without most of the class, I decided to introduce the perfect board game, Settlers of Catan. It shows first hand some important economic principles: changes in price due to scarcity, gains from trade, and as I found out, how to collude. The first time I played with the students I won. Not necessarily a huge feat since none of them had played before and I've certainly spent enough time playing online. However they called for a rematch and I was happy to oblige them one day after school. Again I took an early lead and was close to wrapping up my second victory.

Near the end of the game I got distracted by a phone call from a friend of a friend asking about the Clemson economics program. Suddenly, one of my students came from behind to win the game. So suddenly in fact that I suspected a little foul play. After packing up the game the students let me in on their plan. I'll paraphrase their excited words. "Mr. Brookie we worked together! I traded what she wanted, we put the robber on you, AND we gave her our bonus points! We did that thing you talked about in class. We colluded!" As the regulator, it was important for me to not to get distracted. Then again, at least I know they're learning.

Targeted Advertising to Speeders

I got a speeding ticket last Monday. One of those downhill speed traps that would catch any patriotic speeder. The officer assured me that if I show up for the court date they'll probably drop the charges. It seems the biggest bummer about the speeding tax is that eventually you'll have to pay it. Lucky for me I get an interesting blog post out it. It wasn't the ticket itself, but what happened afterward that was most interesting. By Saturday, just a couple of days later, I had this in my mailbox:

That's a dozen letters from local lawyers letting me know they could help in my case. Apparently my ticket is public information and this is the direct mail version of ambulance chasing. Best of all, most of the letters acknowledged the ridiculousness of the situation. One even stated that I should expect to receive up to twenty similar letters, but that if I wanted quality I should hire them. I think for now I'll go rogue and represent myself.

Stossel and O'Reilly's Bet on Pot