A lawyer named Lawyer? A flowershop owner named Gardner? A pest-control inspector named Roach?

They all sound like punchlines. But they’re all for real, and part of a big collection of name-vocation pairings maintained by Brown University’s Dr. Lewis Lipsitt.

Lipsitt has a hunch that these examples aren’t so coincidental — that the name makes the career:

At the time he told his students the fact that Dr. Fish founded the state’s Oceanographic Institute; that Mr. Rolls was the director of the state’s AAA organization; and that Mr. Hawkes worked at the Audubon Society didn’t mean that there was any psychological reason for their choice of livelihood.

Yet, Lipsitt asked himself after the class, could your interests be influenced by having grown up hearing and saying your name?

“I decided shortly thereafter there might be something to it,” said Lipsitt. “Something is at work subconsciously when you have a repeated reminder.”

Unfortunately, Lipsitt’s collection is apparently all off-line, consisting of newspaper clippings and such in some file drawers. I think he needs to get it up on the Web so we can all ogle it.

And yet, I can’t help but think that there’s an overemphasis on finding a link between a person’s name and their walk of life. If I might draw from Wayne’s World:

Was it Kierkegaard, or perhaps Dick Van Patten, who said, “When you label me, you negate me”?

I should point out that the writer of this article, Kristen Cole, committed a faux pas when she tried to be cute by citing the false Chevy Nova/”no va” cautionary business tale.

Received via email. I think using pink pellets was a nice touch.

I loathe spam as much as the next person. But I have to admit a certain fondness for the celebrity-endorsed variety.

So when I saw an email from retired Minnesota Twin Kirby Puckett in my inbox this morning, I couldn’t help but open it. Surely, the nicest guy in baseball wouldn’t waste my time.

Unfortunately, it turned out to be a pitch for cheap online medications. I guess a Hall of Fame career doesn’t take you as far as it used to.

I mentioned yesterday that my college reunion was scheduled for this coming weekend. Along with my blase attitude toward it — more a function of my hectic work schedule right now than anything else — I casually dropped a line about an informal alum gathering at Woody’s Waterfront that I would probably hit.

Little did I know that the Woody’s gathering represented something more than just a casual get-together.

I got an email today from Rich Anderson, a local and fellow alum. It was a rambling missive that basically expressed a high level of dissatisfaction with the school-sponsored reunion festivities, and suggesting that we all chuck that and just go out and do our own thing, independent of Eckerd. While the overall tone of the email was gentle enough, words like “disarray” and “rebellious” were thrown in, making it clear that the official reunion was coming up lame.

The idea of a wildcat reunion gives me a good chuckle. It takes me back (a little) to my student days, when we would do things like this that, while largely inconsequential, had the desired dual effects of pleasing us and cheesing off the administration. Besides, my original inclination for reunion participation was very much along the lines of what Richie is suggesting: A few drinks, reminiscences, and general chatter/gossip. I can do without a golf tournament, thanks.

I’m not sure what’s going on at Eckerd’s alumni office, but it’s certainly shaping up to be a lackluster weekend. I’m betting they’ve got only a handful of registrations so far, even after waiving the fees on most events. For a small private school that critically relies upon the goodwill of alumni (and their donations), it’s not a particularly smart move.

Of course, none of this changes my time crunch. I’ll make some time to see old friends, but I can’t say just how much time that’ll be.

With the approach of reunion time, I’ve been taking a few strolls down memory lane lately. The funny thing is, most have been about my freshman year, and are populated by characters that I not only lost touch of while still in school, but who also are highly unlikely to ever make a reunion (the odds are excellent that half of them are in jail or in exile). Such remembrances may be worth a separate, dedicated post later tonight, or this week.

I can’t say why I find the opening Flash animation for Florida Shed so amusing. It could be the goofily-belligerent look on the little shed mascot’s face. Or that he’s leading with his left while jabbing with his right. Or the fact that he even has a left and a right (not to mention a face). Having him punch out a couple of hurricanes was a nice, timely touch.

All I know is that I liked it so much, that I saved the actual .swf file to my hard drive.

(Adjust volume accordingly, although you won’t get the full effect unless you watch it along with the accompanying cheesy jingle.)

Granted, with constant security shortcomings that culminated in a Federal government warning against its regular use, Internet Explorer’s name is currently mud. Does that mean Microsoft’s domination of the browser market is kaput?

Internet pioneer Marc Andreessen thinks the stage is set for that, which gives the notion credence with many within the tech community. Some even offer some anecdotal evidence:

In September, technology maven Jason Calacanis noted that in doing log file reports for tech site Engadget.com, he found that the site’s audience put Firefox in the No. 2 spot, with only 53 percent using IE. Most estimates of IE dominance put IE use closer to 95 percent.

Of course, with evidence like this, you get the feeling that the anti-IE/pro-Firefox voices are clutching at straws. IE is “only” at 53 percent? Among visitors to a fairly hard-core techie blog? Given the geeky audience, I’d expect Firefox to be the top referring browser, by a longshot. That IE still dominates among this group tells me that the user movement away from Microsoft’s browser is exaggerated. If those most intimately familiar with the tech issues behind browsers aren’t defecting en masse, then I don’t expect to see it on a mass-audience scale.

Fortunately, the analysts provide some clarity:

“The war is over, and Microsoft is the winner — no question,” Yankee Group analyst Tony White told NewsFactor. “Netscape is number two, but IE is still clearly the leader, and is expected to be for quite some time.”

A prediction that Opera or Firefox can surpass IE is just “insane,” said White, who added that user numbers are consistently tweaked and presented as fact by those who prefer non-IE browsers.

“There’s a lot of bogus information online from people who have a vested interest in seeing browsers like Opera succeed,” White noted. “But saying IE is being knocked from the top spot doesn’t make it true.”

In fact, Andreessen’s entire premise is a good example of how groupthink tunnel vision can lead to broader assumptions that are fundamentally false. A tiny blip of increase in Firefox usage is quickly exaggerated as a building trend, and suddenly techies are declaring the end of IE’s reign.

In fact, that perception is fed by a very narrow set of inputs: Lots of developer sites and blogs are touting a “switch to Firefox” grassroots campaign, hardcore Web users are adopting the Mozilla browser, and some blogs are even configuring themselves to be non-IE optimized. All this creates a buzz, but it blinds them to how limited this movement really is.

The fact remains that IE is bundled onto practically every mass-market computer out there, and as long as that’s the case, it’s going to be the predominant browser, hands down. To the average user, IE is the default program for accessing all Web sites. It doesn’t occur to them that there should be an alternative way to do that, any more than there should be an alternative for, say, their keyboard. Installing another browser, that won’t let them use some of their everyday bookmarks (like many bank and ecommerce sites) correctly, doesn’t make an awful lot of sense.

As exciting as the prospect of renewed competition in the browser market is, it’s not going to happen. As long as Windows is the king of PC operating systems, Microsoft will be calling the shots on the browser that comes with it, and by default that will be IE. Without a pre-installed spot on desktops, Firefox, Opera and other browsers will continue to be limited-scope fringe pursuits. Even alternate browser developments by big players like AOL and Google are iffy propositions because of this barrier.

This weekend is my give-or-take 10-year college reunion. It’s “give-or-take” because I actually graduated from Eckerd in 1993, so it’s eleven years; but because of some cockamanie “clustering” system the alumni association uses, it’s anyone’s guess as to when they actually get around to a particular class. In fact, I believe my class was pretty much overlooked for this year until a few people complained, at which point we were included after the fact.

Is that a negative enough intro?

I haven’t registered for anything. I live about 15 minutes away from campus, so it’s not a big deal for me to just drop in. And I would absolutely love to meet up with some classmates who I haven’t seen since graduation. Even others, with whom I’ve been in sporadic contact over the years, will be here. It would be great to get together over drinks or dinner or something.

Unfortunately, the timing’s not great for me. This is the thick of my busy season at work, so I just haven’t had much time or energy to devote to this (along with several other things). I can certainly get away for some meet-and-greets, but fishing trips and other extended forays are out of the question.

If nothing else, I’ll hit an informal reunion get-together at Woody’s Waterfront on St. Pete Beach, this Thursday at 6PM (if any alum are reading, consider this your invitation). That’s about the right kind of atmosphere: Right on the water, knocking back a few, and casually catching up.

Who listens to satellite radio? Primarily new-car buyers, who tend to be men, which tends to dictate how programming on XM and Sirius is created.

The connection with cars is most interesting. The most intensive radio listening takes place while people are driving. Television dominates in the home, and the workplace can be spotty for either medium. Drivetime gives you a captive audience (unless, like me, the driver resorts to non-radio music sources). So it makes sense to partner with automakers to really push the service, especially since they’re investing in the companies:

Even though Sirius has lost more than $1 billion in the last five years and XM has lost $1.5 billion since 1992, they’ve attracted investments from most of the large auto makers.

Daimler-Chrysler has invested $100 million in Sirius. Honda Motor Co. has put about $50 million into XM while General Motors has invested $120 million and given XM a $250 million line of credit.

And that’s not all. There are other incentives: GM and Honda pay for the first three months XM subscriptions in some model cars, said Chance Patterson, an XM spokesman.

The Acura TL, Cadillac Escalade and Chevrolet Cobalt advertise XM radio availability. “You go to a dealership and XM has a visible presence there,” Patterson said. “Most dealers have an XM kiosk with a radio and a lineup.”

“How important is the car industry? Critical,” he said. “Half of our subscribers come from the new car market.”

With more than a hundred channels/stations, there’s enough room for plenty of gender-neutral programming, especially since most of the bands are music. But keeping in mind the male customer, there are things like a Playboy channel (audio-only sex talk — what’s the point?), and more:

But there’s also lots of testosterone-tinged programming, especially on underdog Sirius, which has spent millions on deals to air the National Football League, National Basketball Association and National Hockey League games.

It has a garage rock channel produced by Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band guitarist “Little Steven” Van Zandt and is launching another produced by rap star Eminem and Jimmy Iovine, chairman of Interscope Records. Sportswriter Mitch Albom, football commentator John Madden and the men of the Orange County Chopper custom bike shop all have shows.

Then there’s the “Wiseguy Show,” promoted as a celebration of “life, the arts and meatballs.”

This is a good analysis of the satellite market and how it’s taking shape. It goes a long way toward explaining why Sirius’ snaring of Howard Stern could be such a watershed moment.

They wanted “St. Petersburg Parkway”. They wanted “William C. Cramer Memorial Highway”.

So they merged: The stretch of Interstate 275 that passes through Pinellas County (all within St. Petersburg) will now officially be known as The St. Petersburg Parkway/William C. Cramer Memorial Highway.

And of course, despite all the new signage and government references, no one will stop calling it I-275.

Will she pop off, or won’t she? Watch it happen (maybe) on the Mount St. Helens VolcanoCam.

Currently, it’s kinda dull. Now, if they were planning on tossing some virgins into the hole, for an old-fashioned volcano god sacrifice…

It’s Friday. End of a long week. On the cusp of an even longer week. I’m dry, folks.

Good thing the little piss-boy at Pee-Mail isn’t.

Watching “And You Don’t Stop”, a historical documentary on the origins of rap/hip-hop. Lots of reminiscenses from the oldtimers, including Grandmaster Flash, Fab 5 Freddy, Run-DMC. Plenty of footage from the late ’70s and into the ’80s, with enough images of striped polyester jumpsuits to put a smile on my face.

Now I don’t feel so bad about staying in tonight. Even if all this is coming at me on VH1.

Why did so many consider John Kerry the winner in his first debate with George W. Bush? It could be that the President’s usually sharp parrying skills are rusty, thanks to the protective bubble he’s created for himself during his Presidency.

“Presidents tend to listen and make decisions; they don’t engage in debates with their opponents or really with anyone else. They listen and make decisions,” Karen Hughes told Fox News Channel on September 28.

Many media analysts, including some who scored the first debate as a draw, noted that the camera caught the president frequently looking bored, annoyed, unsettled or distracted during Kerry’s attacks on his leadership.

“Bush has been living in a bubble for too long,” Richard Reeves, who proclaimed Kerry the winner last week, wrote in the Charleston Gazette.

“What’s wrong with him? I would say he has a bad case of Ovalitis – an ear infection endemic to the Oval Office. Sit there long enough, and you don’t hear anything you don’t want to hear,” according to Reeves.

One of the pratfalls of power is a tendency to overrule or dismiss anything you don’t want to face. Bush’s resoluteness is often touted as a strength, especially in his role as Commander in Chief. But the other edge of the sword is the development of a bit of tunnel vision. If you get out of the habit of arguing your points by seriously engaging other viewpoints, you have trouble getting back in that groove.

By contrast, consider Kerry’s service in the Senate. Senators do nothing but argue, negotiate, glad-hand, influence. In a sense, he’s been rehearsing for these debates for years. Add to this that Bush’s political career has never included stints in a legislative body: He’s been a governor, another executive-level role where you don’t have to engage in discourse unless you want to (or really, really have to, which is rare).

Let’s hope the President busts that bubble in time for Debate No. 2.

I’ve lamented the sad state of sub-literacy in the Digital Age before. But that doesn’t mean I can’t derive some humor from it, as in the case of Florida artist Maria Alquilar and her idiotic misspellings of well-known historical names on her public-library mural.

It’s bad enough to commit spelling errors on a computer screen or in print; but because it’s relatively effortless to generate letters in those mediums, it’s almost understandable. Doing it through the process of inlaying ceramic tiles, though? That takes a lot of work. You’d think she would have taken five minutes to check on the names, and avoid any mistakes.

Not that something so fundamental would occur to this artiste:

Reached at her Miami studio Wednesday by The Associated Press, Alquilar said she was willing to fix the work, which is 16 feet wide and made up of brightly colored ceramic pieces. But she offered no apologizes for the 11 misspellings, including “Eistein,” “Shakespere” and “Michaelangelo,” among the 175 names.

“The importance of this work is that it is supposed to unite people,” Alquilar said. “They are denigrating my work and the purpose of this work.”…

Even though I was on my hands and knees laying the installation out, I didn’t see it,” she said.

Anyway, she said, the mistakes wouldn’t even register with a true artisan.

“The people that are into humanities, and are into Blake’s concept of enlightenment, they are not looking at the words,” she said. “In their mind, the words register correctly.”

I guess cracking open a dictionary dashes your artisan credentials.

Almost a month ago, Rachel* at SoHoTampa made note of the opposition to putting in some sidewalks in south Tampa neighborhoods.

The anti-sidewalk sentiment appears to be a cross-Bay phenomenon: Residents in Largo are spurning efforts by city government to sidewalk their streets.

Cited reasons against sidewalks usually emphasize the encroachment into large front yards. It’s a valid enough reason, but I have my own opinion regarding the real, less often expressed reason:

Generally, I’m in favor of more sidewalks being built around the Bay area. Sidewalks encourage pedestrian traffic, which is sorely lacking in a sprawl-based community like this. That’s the very same reason residential neighborhoods don’t want them, of course, because the implication is pedestrian=no car=poor/homeless/bum. Who wants to make it easier for bums and other shady types to make their way to your front door?

I was just in a meeting today where a recent survey about perceptions on Florida was mentioned. Among other things, a knock against most of the metro areas was a lack of cohesiveness and pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods. Rolling out sidewalks all over the place won’t completely solve this, but I think it’s a positive step.

Filing this under my “the world is in my mind” section:

Just turned on the TV to TBS in time to see a new promo for their “Sex and the City” reruns. The background music on the promo was the Fischerspooner vs. Billy Squier mashup, “Everybody Wants You To Emerge”.

It just so happens that I’ve been addictively listening to that very same song on my iPod lately. It came on the “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” Soundtrack.

I don’t know if this means I’m cooler than I thought, or exactly the opposite.

I guess this kind of linkage between the shows makes sense. It fits right in with the original conception of “Sex” as a gay-man ensemble cast.

For all the bitching Howard Stern has done over the years about the FCC, I never would have guessed he really would do anything about it. The expert opinion agreed:

Rumors have been flying that the current climate would force Stern out at Infinity and into satellite radio’s open arms. Stern, whose contract with Infinity runs out at the end of 2005, has long hinted that he might just make such a move.

But [publisher of Talkers magazine Michael] Harrison, for one, thinks Stern’s job at Infinity is safe. He said the shock jock king, who analysts estimate brings in as much as $25 million in profits for Infinity each year, always manages to play anti-smut campaigns to his advantage. This time, said Harrison, he’s done it by blaming election-year politics and efforts by the Bush administration to appeal to conservative voters.

“It’s been good for him,” said Harrison. “His ratings are up.”

So much for that line of thinking. Stern dropped a bomb today by announcing he would bolt broadcast for a five-year contract with Sirius satellite radio, starting in 2006.

Big move? Yeah.

“Imagine if the New York Giants left the NFL for the American Football League in 1960. Or if the Green Bay Packers joined the XFL,” said Quinnipiac University professor Rich Hanley. “Stern’s decision to go to satellite radio is that and much more. He will basically drag the rest of radio — or at least the form of radio that matters most to profitability — with him.”

I think it’s important to take note of the main reason Stern decided to go to satellite: The lack of broadcast regulations. Without that, he wouldn’t have made this deal.

Even if this addition fulfills Sirius’ wildest dreams about boosting subscriber rolls by a couple of million, it’ll still be a much tinier listening audience, no matter what. Already a big fish in the biggest of ponds, Stern will go to being a whale in a fishbowl. Yet the drastic shrinkage of audience doesn’t matter as much as the removal of the regulatory headaches Stern’s had to deal with for twenty years. That’s significant, because again, it’s the only thing that enticed Stern about Sirius.

Given that, it’ll be interesting if the next two years brings any sort of drive from Washington to apply regulations to the satellite spectrum. If the FCC somehow gains jurisdiction over XM, Sirius and any other satellite providers (probably as an extension of jurisdiction into cable television), Stern will find himself in the same fix he was in on broadcast radio. In that case, he’ll come off looking like an idiot.

The other consideration here is Howard Stern’s E! show. Unlike other radio personalities, he’s got that added exposure on television. Assuming he stays on TV — and that’s not a sure thing, if there’s a falling-out with Infinity and E! parent Viacom, but chances are good for maintaining it — he won’t become completely marginalized by a move to satellite.

The last thing to factor in is that Stern is well into the closing act of his career. His drawing power is still strong, but he’ll be getting closer to an age where he’ll want to hang it up. He’s already established himself, so he’s got little to lose by making such a dramatic move. Even if it doesn’t pan out, he’ll be able to bow out gracefully.

Wal-Mart is already the world’s biggest retailer, by a long shot. How can it possibly get bigger? By building even more stores, even in spots only a few miles away from existing Wal-Marts.

It’s a strategy very reminiscent of Starbucks. The coffeeshop giant is known for going overboard on store openings, especially in urban areas. It’s not unusual to see two Starbucks on diagonaly street corners in some towns. Yet improbably, it works. People can’t seem to get enough caffeine, and single-store sales remain robust despite what should be over-saturation. I’m sure Wal-Mart took note of Starbucks’ success with this, and decided to apply it to its own expansion strategy.

Wal-Mart is already hugely successful, so it can gamble on something like this. A non-specialty discounter isn’t a coffeeshop, though. There’s a different dynamic: Starbucks stores are more of a social setting, so that helps them draw in and retain customers. Wal-Mart does this to an extent, but it’s not quite the same. I’m skeptical.

Upshot, I suppose the whole country will be overrun with Wal-Marts. It’s the anti-sprawlers’ nightmare come true.

It’s understandable, in the heat of debate, to make a misstatement. And confusing a “dot-com” for a “dot-org” is usually a minor enough slip.

Still, I’m betting Dick Cheney will double- and triple-check himself the next time he utters a website name, considering the boner that his “factcheck.com” citation last night has become.

Cheney accidentally said “.com” instead of “.org” during the televised debate. Internet surfers who visited factcheck.com were redirected to the home page of billionaire anti-Bush activist George Soros, with the statement “Why we must not re-elect President Bush” at the top of the screen.

The Soros site also claims “President Bush is endangering our safety, hurting our vital interests, and undermining American values.”

I’m glad that the employees at FactCheck.com had a good sense of humor in redirecting traffic to the most anti-Bush site they could find. They could just as easily have taken the crude route and steered all those hits to a porn site.

Funny thing is, while watching the debate last night, I had an impulse to visit the URL as soon as Cheney mentioned it. But I didn’t.

I, for one, certainly hope this gains some traction: Loaded Mouth is sponsoring a “Biggest Asshole in Blogging” contest.

Talk about fertile ground.

And yes, feel free to nominate me. Although really, I generally reserve my assholeishness for offline pursuits.

Rest in peace, Rodney.

If you can’t find a copy of the above boardgame — of which I have no information beyond the picture — then slide a copy of Caddyshack into the VCR or DVD player, and laugh your ass off. There’s no more fitting tribute or way to show some respect.

Speaking of respect:

In a 1986 interview, he explained the origin of his “respect” trademark:

“I had this joke: ‘I played hide and seek; they wouldn’t even look for me.’ To make it work better, you look for something to put in front of it: I was so poor, I was so dumb, so this, so that. I thought, ‘Now what fits that joke?’ Well, ‘No one liked me’ was all right. But then I thought, a more profound thing would be, ‘I get no respect.’”

A great look at the anatomy of a classic one-liner.