Citizen Mom

Look, someone just tell me if it's OK to eat the waffle fries or not.

 

(image via @samplereality and @baznet  )

Hmmmmm.

Does "gay it up" mean go in and act dumb and reinforce a bunch of stereotypes? Or does "gay it up" mean non-ridiculous gay people going in with their kids and watching them climb all over the germ delivery apparatus, er, play equipment.

Isn't withholding your business from Chick-Fil-A the best way to show disapproval of their anti-gay corporate worldview? I'm struggling with this one, because those nuggets are so very delicious.

For the future that we wait

Can we stop talking about what's going to happen to the Paterno shrine now?

It hurt like hell to wake up Sunday to see the statue come down, and the look on Jack's face when I told him made me catch my breath. I said Joe hadn't shown leadership when he didn't call the police, that he didn't protect the kids when Jerry Sandusky was abusing them at Penn State. Factually correct, yet hardly enough words to contain all the heartbreak.

A friend reminded me that this is what comes of erecting statues to the living. Hard to argue right now. I guess the next questions we'll all obsess on will be what happens to that space on Curtin Road, and -- once again -- what should happen to the JoePa statue?

 

Please restrain yourself from saying "Twingo"

FULL-SIZED CARD HERE

via sarahsfav.es

Sarah Evans' Twitter Bio Bingo. I maintain that bios written in the third person should be an instant win. Pair it with an egg avatar and it's Yahtzee.

Joe Paterno, Penn State, and how our own errors in thinking let this happen

Updated: 

You can also read this on NewsWorks (and see other pics), and listen to  an audio portion from WHYY.

--- 

In my house, there isn’t a room that doesn’t bear at least some evidence of my relationship with Penn State. Since the child sex assault scandal began unfolding last year, only one piece of my Penn State collection went into the trash can. 

It was a dark-blue T-shirt, with a sketch of Joe Paterno’s face and the words LET GO AND LET JOE in white, a play on the old saw about turning your troubles over to the Lord, trusting he’ll handle everything. 

In hindsight, I see how deeply bizarre that sounds, and how perfectly it sums up how and why we got here. The shirt (bought at Cheesesteak Tees, I think)  just seemed funny, so ironically over-the-top that only another Penn Stater would understand. It went into the garbage when the thought of wearing it left me feeling disgusted and ashamed, and afraid of what else we didn’t know.

With the Freeh Report released, we know more than ever and it’s nothing short of horrifying. The report isn’t just a retelling of how there were “more red flags than we could count,” as Freeh said, nor is it about pinning it all on the dead guy as others insist (they’re wrong).

It confirms things we didn't want to accept about all of the men running the university, including the one to whom they all deferred. It proves that “let go and let Joe” was the guiding principle at Penn State. It wasn't the law and it certainly was not compassion for those boys.

Those boys. Some the same age my son was when we took him to his first game, dressed him in PSU gear and waved to President Spanier as he passed by in a minibus on the way back from Beaver Stadium. Nobody cared enough to do anything for those boys.

Let go and let Joe.

Everyone knows Joe had an effect on people it is accurate to describe as religious.  A few words from him could revive exhausted THON dancers and shake loose money from donors’ pockets. His words certainly could have stopped Jerry Sandusky from abusing kids.

Penn State's motto is "Success With Honor."

Imagine the honor that would have come with the success of Joe being the coach who took a public stand for protecting children, the one who refused to tolerate the mere idea of a child abuser in his midst? But even the janitors at the bottom of the blue-and-white food chain knew no good would come of blowing the whistle. Blowing the whistle is the coach’s job.

To the Paterno family, which released its own statement, no sane adult would knowingly cover for a child sex predator. They say if Joe had “understood what Sandusky was,” he would have done more. No one really expects the Paternos to reject their patriarch. But.  

Realizing all this hurts. It makes me nauseated, it makes me ashamed I was part of that culture of unquestioning loyalty that let atrocities go on right under JoePa’s famous nose.

Does understanding all these things mean I don’t love Penn State, that I should take my diploma off the wall and send it back? No, it means I believe a better Penn State exists. That there is more good to be done. That I want to do better by its students than was done for those other boys, the ones Sandusky and his enablers destroyed.

A moment keeps coming back to me: Oct. 29, 2011, the weekend of that freaky Halloween snowstorm, when we joined a bunch of Penn State friends to watch the Illinois game. The group of us that had bonded over long nights in the Collegian newsroom gathered in a New Jersey living room to watch on TV, cheering and pointing out Joe to the kids.

Should we have known that would be the last time a big win would give us that kind of pride? That it would be the last time, probably for a long time, that Beaver Stadium would be that innocent universe of joy it became in the moments just after a win?

I’m involved in alumni groups, I mentor students, I give money and time back to my school. None of that changes for me. Some are calling for the football program to be shut down, if not the whole university. Penalties, charges, fines, yes, but dismantle Penn State? Of course not.

Letting the entire institution be defined by one person is our yesterday. I’d rather work to build Penn State’s future. Or maybe, just go back to the start. From the 1941 campus guide for freshmen, via Papergreat:

There is something in Penn State that goes on and on, unchanging even while buildings, faculties, and student bodies come and go. If you find out what that is, you will have found the source of the notable Penn State spirit and loyalty. 

SHORE THING: Oh, Those Wildwood Days

If you haven't yet picked up a copy of my dear friend and Jersey Shore defender Jen A. Miller's latest book, put it
on your list of essentials. The Jersey Shore: Atlantic City to Cape May isn't just an updated version of the one she wrote a few years back, it's a total overhaul, stuffed nearly to bursting with planning tips, reviews and Shore secrets that only she could pull together.

It's not only a good read (and it is), the book is a must-have if you're planning a trip to the South Jersey Shore. I'm proud of her, and was flattered to be asked to write an essay about the Wildwoods for it, which I'll share with Citizen Mom readers here. Enjoy my essay, then buy the whole book!

My Wildwoods

 By Amy Z. Quinn

If a resort city’s streets could talk, you’d hear Wildwood’s sassy mouth a mile away.  

If you’re about to get in a bar fight, North Wildwood is the chick you want at your back, because she always brings friends. West Wildwood’s the quiet type, not so much ignored as she is happy to be left alone.

In fact, if we’re imagining the Wildwoods as a quartet of sisters, the Crest is the one who left Senior Week behind and settled down with a family. But every now and again, even a grown-up lady likes to party.

For me, it’s impossible to think of that clutch of towns along the 5-mile island near New Jersey’s southern tip as anything but members of a family, with similar features -- the broad, ever-growing beaches connected by that great spine of a Boardwalk -- yet each a somehow distinct, unique version of the other. It’s a collection of flirts and matriarchs, of immigrants and visionaries, living in a world of both grit and luxury.

And always, of possibility.

In the early 1970s, my parents, an industrious blue-collar couple from Philly, saw possibility in a rambling, Depression-era Dutch colonial up the block from the Firehouse Tavern on Pine Avenue. Behind this big house, ringing a cement courtyard, stood three small cottages, which my parents -- their creativity tapped out after selecting names for their six children -- dubbed A, B and C.

For nearly 30 years, they rented the cottages to a rotating cast of characters, usually young people, some looking for a vacation place and others who stayed the summer, working on the boardwalk spinning prize wheels or twisting custard cones. My older sisters, already teenagers in the ‘70s and ‘80s, each took their turn living and working in Wildwood, tasting independence for the first time even as my Dad hovered protectively nearby.

For part of each year, my mother would install herself in the Big House, her cooking sending the smell of spaghetti sauce wafting through the wrought-iron air vents. She’d spend her days sprucing up the cottages or shopping along Pacific Avenue, leaving my brother and I just enough freedom to roam the neighborhood, which forever smelled of burnt toast owing to the bakery a few blocks away.

In the evenings, we’d all sit on the front porch, bodies sunken into aged red-painted wicker rockers, beholding a predictable yet ever-changing parade of people making their way along Pine Avenue toward the beach and Boardwalk.  

As dusk fell, it would be parents pushing strollers or holding the hands of little ones impatient for that moment when the Tilt-a-Whirl makes its first furious spin. Next would come teenagers, hair-sprayed girls dressed to impress the boys in gold chains who’d have to be home by curfew. Still later, the strollers came back bearing toddlers overtired and cranky or already sound asleep, and young adults would head out for the night, bound for Kelly’s Cafe or the Stardust or the old Penalty Box, where the bartenders wore striped shirts and whistles like NHL linesmen.

Of course, everyone knows the island’s more recent story, how through a mixture of poor planning, mismanagement and changing tastes, the good times waned in the Wildwoods. Like an aging party girl, things along the Boardwalk became less fun and more tawdry, and Pacific Avenue’s charms fell away like flakes of sunburned skin.

These days, I’m happy to say, the things are coming around again in the Wildwoods. Simple economics have led many people back to the island, though of course keeping them there is always the trick.

It surely sounds overly simplistic to say things just feel good again in Wildwood, but there it is. I catch the expectant, excited look on my son’s face each time we cross that bridge into town and the giant Ferris wheel comes into view, and I know. I see the young couples touring condos for sale, and families pouring out of minivans into neon-lit hotels, and I feel it.

Like I said, possibility.

So, what *does* Naked Philly have to hide?

Y'know, besides the names of who owns, writes and edits their site?

Actually, it's no mystery: Naked Philly (ironic slogan: We've Got Nothing To Hide!) is owned and operated by Ori Feibush of OCF Realty (Ironic bio note: "Transparency is a word you hear a lot these days. And at OCF, it really means something.")

From my understanding of the conversation Feibush and I had today, the site serves two purposes. First, the Naked Philly blog is supposed to build buzz for the neighborhoods in which OCF Realty does business, which sounds a bit like the Philebrity/Blatstein model of early-days covert advertorial blogging. Second, Feibush told me, the Naked Philly site was launched in advance of some crazyass mapping tool he's almost ready to launch and which actually sounds pretty cool. 

The idea, he told me, was for the mapping tool to be ready to go around the same time as the Naked Philly site. It hasn't happened that way.

What has happened instead?  Since the demise of the much-beloved but short-lived Brownstoner Philly site in December, there's been a bit of a rush to fill the void in covering the city's land use/building/development/real estate scene -- an area of activity so ripe with news it practically falls from the trees. The site I work for, Plan Philly, is part of that world, though the mission there is a legitimately journalistic one. 

The way Feibush explained it, the Naked Philly site has sort of taken on a life of its own in the meantime, as people are genuinely interested in what's happening in the city's built environment. "The idea is to showcase properties in areas that otherwise wouldn't get noticed," he said. Fair enough.

Problem is, the folks "writing" the site (more on that in a second) have spent so much time reprinting press releases, running unsourced information and borrowing from others, they're building much more suspicion than credibility. Some of their posts are really good, but lacking essential information like where the information comes from or why anyone should believe it.

Earlier this week I called them out on lifting ideas and specific words from two of my stories. To his credit, Feibush responded promptly, appropriately and professionally to my concerns, telling me today it was "blatantly apparent" that his writer had used my work. It was a difficult conversation and I give him credit for it.

As for the writer, I agreed not to out her (though I do know who she is) because her name hadn't been on the original posts. That's called professional courtesy -- much like the practice of linking and crediting others' work when you reference it in your blog posts. See what I did there?

Anyway, I'm over it and willing to take Feibush at his word when he says the site never intended to come off as some sketchy cloak-and-dagger thing. And because I have seen some genuinely useful posts on Naked Philly, I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and will keep reading. Perhaps you will, too.

On the familiar "Hail Girard," and never taking sides against the family

This is my father, Girard College class of January '47. 

On Sept. 9, 1938, my grandmother took him on a streetcar ride from Cantrell Street in South Philly to the Girard College campus. They went through the gates and to the small guard house just inside, where the guard made a telephone call and my Dad looked out at Founder's Hall, thinking it must be a palace.

A few minutes later a woman came along, and my grandmother introduced her to my Dad. The woman remarked to my grandmother, a divorcee with another son three years older, how polite my father was. He blushed.

They went to a building just to the right of Founder's Hall, in the shadow of a grove of trees, where he was measured and given a uniform, shoes, the whole kit. Then my grandmother said goobye and explained he'd be staying there, to go to school and live.

This would be his Home.

His brother couldn't join him, because he was too old for the entrance requirements, but he'd have lots of new brothers at Girard. In those days, that was literal truth: Girard boys were wards of the school, even the ones who had mothers. 

He cried. His mother told him it would be an adventure. He believed her.

He was almost exactly the same age my son is right now.  

When I was little, we'd go to Founders Day, strolling around the campus while my Dad stopped to chat, shake hands and/or reminisce with what seemed like every other guy we passed. The wives embraced my mother, greeting each other like cousins, and they exchanged brags while we kids rolled our eyes. 

He'd take us inside the breathtaking chapel, where despite the carved admonition THE LORD IS IN HIS HOLY PLACE KEEP SILENCE BEFORE HIM, he'd whisper to me, proudly, how the chapel was non-denominational so all the boys could pray together. He'd point out how there were no crosses, no images of Christ, how he made his Sacraments at the Gesu Church and how he and the Jewish kid in his bunk used to joke they must really be brothers because they looked so much alike, dark-eyed and tanned from summers at the Girard camp.

When we didn't go along, my Dad would bring home Hum Muds wrapped in waxed paper, and we'd dunk them in milk. As a kid I wore his letterman's sweater, a steel grey G sewn onto scratchy scarlet wool.

Now he's old, one of the many elderly alumni Girard is losing every day. These days when I take him to Founder's Day, we sit in the Armory at ever-smaller tables of his brothers, who all kiss me on the cheek and tell me how much I look like my mother.  I try not to cry as he struggles up the long, turning staircase inside Founder's Hall, walking through the rooms full of Girard relics, pointing himself out in photographs, naming his friends. I pull out the bound volumes of the campus paper from the 1940s, and pick out his name so many times I lose count. 

Because "Russell Johnson" asked, this is why I can't be truly objective about what happens at Girard College and to its students, any more than I could be objective about any other member of my extended family. That statue of Stephen Girard is as close to a paternal grandfather as I ever got.

To be clear: Nothing I write comes out of personal animus toward Autumn Adkins Graves, whom I've never met. Rather than having an axe to grind against her, I admire the brains and balls it takes for a black woman not even 40 years old to be chosen to lead a school like Girard.

I find myself identifying with her in many ways, not just because we're the same age but because back in 1937, neither of us would have been welcome in the Girard family that so unconditionally embraced my Dad.

Yet I'm concerned by what I'm hearing, especially comments about how it's becoming "Autumn Adkins Academy" and "You have to spend money to make money," and most damning, from a current student: "Girard College does not feel like home anymore." I understand that some staff layoffs are part of department restructuring, but there are other issues.

I disclosed my conflict in the earlier post because I teach my Media Ethics students to be truthful when something could compromise their objectivity. I didn't go into all the gory details because, as I teach my News Writing students, we are not the story. I will continue to ask questions, seek information, and analyze the many documents now coming my way because that's what I teach my Investigative Reporting students. I'll continue to provide a place here for those who care about Girard to share their thoughts because that's what a blog is for.

You can either understand, or not. It doesn't change what I do.

Tough days, layoffs at Girard College

While most of the city's attention has been focused on the situation inside the troubled Philadelphia School District, things inside Girard College seem to be in a state of rapid decline.

There are a number of reasons I can't approach this story as a neutral reporter but I am happy to provide a place here for folks on campus to tell their stories in the hope that the city's reporters will take notice.

Last semester, I heard disturbing reports about things like the kitchen running out of food and many students who hadn't eaten much at dinner the night before (apparently pork was served and many student don't dig on swine) receiving only fruit at breakfast -- hardly enough to fire up the brain for a day of learning. 

I've heard repeated reports of former staffers and students being discouraged, or outright prohibited, from visiting the campus. It's not for me to blame any of this on Autumn Adkins, the thirtysomething who became Girard's president in 2009, but things do not seem to be moving in the right direction.

Most recently, on April 14, my sources say, about 10 teachers and staff members were given official layoff notices. All of them showed up to work the next day, where students were understandably upset. That happens at any school where beloved teachers depart, but at Girard it's important to remember that the school itself is designed to be a -- and sometimes, the only -- stable and consistent thing in the child's life.

Aside from the money story, there's a human story here. Regardless of the school's history or what anybody thinks about Stephen Girard, there are kids on campus hurting and they deserve better.

Do you work at Girard College, or are you a student? Please feel free to leave your thoughts/tips/information here or email me at citizenmom@gmail.com . Hail Girard.

 

 

MEATY: Why foodies should be protesting Penn State funding cuts

Over on StateCollege.com, Michele Marchetti offers a look at the Penn State Meats Lab, its Friday meat market and the critical role Penn State plays in the local food movement:

Because of the educational opportunities the Meats Lab offers, colleagues in Connecticut and New York have described it as a backbone of the local food movement, he said. “Pennsylvania has more meat plants than any other state, because they’re so small,” Raines says.

“There are almost 100 USDA-inspected plants in Pennsylvania. We keep quite busy keeping all these other little guys going.” When I ask Raines whether Gov. Tom Corbett’s proposed budget could threaten the future of that mission, he replied: “We have no idea, honestly, how we’re going to fare; that’s about the best answer I can give.”

via www.statecollege.com

Read the whole story for details that will leave you hungry for a burger brought to you by Dear Old State. For maximum effect, top it with a slice of cheddar from the Creamery. Forget farm to table, this is campus to table. 

See Jane. See Jane Tweet. Tweet, Jane, Tweet.

Just read about a fascinating bit of parenting discussion at SXSW on raising digital natives, that is, kids who grow up online and using mobile technology. Now, I'm not sure my kid would be ready for a Twitter account at age 7, as mentioned in the piece. But one angle of the discussion, about how TV watching fits in, rang true in Citizen Mom's house: 

The main point of disagreement amongst the group arose over the issue of limiting TV time. Bracken, for instance, will not let his daughter watch TV, but has no problem showing her streaming Netflix shows on his iPad. Sinker agreed, noting the unlike regular TV, streaming media contains little or no commercials for unhealthy foods or products parents might find to be objectionable. Some in the audience did not agree with this explanation, however, and called Bracken's approach hypocritical. (InnovationNews Daily, via @NatashaChart)

To me there's nothing hypocritical about this, in fact, controlling what visual media kids consume is as important as controlling how much is watched and on what device. This is why as a parent I've always loved On Demand kids programming so much -- it isn't just being able to cue up Phineas and Ferb whenever and wherever, it's being able to do so in a way that avoids the commercials for Totino's Pizza Rolls and Fuzzoodles. It's about monitoring quality, sometimes more than quantity.

I'm convinced that we avoided turning Jack into one of those kids who demands a new toy every time he's in the store by keeping him away from TV commercials for as long as possible. Now, at age 9, he not only prefers watching TV programming online or on demand, but the very idea of having to show up in front of the TV at a certain time to watch a certain show is alien. It's just not the way his world works.