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My childhood nickname was Binie. This is a huge confession. Still, the net has given me, like everyone else, permission to confess. Binie was short for my middle name, which I will in no way repeat out loud to any living soul. In addition, according to family stories, I somewhat resembled the character “Suzuki Beane” (1961).  Apparently, since I wore jeans with similar turned-up cuffs, and an attitude with similar turned-up edges, the nickname stuck. Suzuki Beane, who lived on Bleeker Street in Greenwich Village, was the child of hipster parents. She befriended a square named Henry, and the two of them ditched school toRead More →

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In: Fun Facts, Technoculture, This is my life?
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When I was growing up in Manhattan, my very first phone number was LO4-4327. It’s funny to me that I still remember it after all these years. I wonder how many people remember their first phone number. I haven’t used it since I was 9 or 10. But, there it is, still in my head. Erica Jong’s recent column on HuffPo is about nostalgia and New York telephone exchanges. Thus my ponderings on LO4 and Manhattan. Many years after I left New York, I figured out that the first two letters of my number represented where I lived. Watching some old black and white movieRead More →

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In cleaning out my office today, I discovered a pair of old black and white photos from my childhood. I was probably a year old in the arms of Aaron Henry, a famous civil rights leader. My grandmother, who hosted Henry in her home, who was a district-level politician in Chelsea in New York City at the height of the 60s.  She was progress, well-known, and well-respected. Yes, being radical is in my genetic code. Here is the text of the note my mother sent me with the pictures: The occasion of the photographs was a trip Aaron Henry made to NYC to seek supportRead More →

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In: Rhetoric and Communication, This Internet Life!
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What is the difference is between a blog and a journal? Mimi Nguyen’s Slander page has a section of blogs. Surfing from her page onto her friends’ pages shows they also have blogs. It took me a while to figure out what a blog was exactly, probably because I was caffeine deprived. But ‘blog, which is short for weblog, is basically a surfing journal. Blogs have become pretty popular, it seems, especially since there are whole webrings devoted to blogging. Blogs have become an integral part of web culture just like zines. Now, Mimi’s Slander page has an interesting journal entry that talks about whetherRead More →