Word: trivia
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...Western Reserve campus. Owner Stan Heilburn considers his store "a propaganda agency for LSD users, to counter the effects of a bad press." The propaganda works-at least in Ohio: 200 to 300 people press in on weekday nights; weekends, up to a thousand customers clamor for medium-priced trivia, including Yugoslavian pipes ($3.00), and off-beat books and records. "We sell a lot of things that are generally available," concedes Heilburn. But the psychedelic label adds a commercial gloss. "It puts things in a new light. This is what makes these places...
...rest inside is a bit more predictable, The usual calculated whimsy, the trivia, the place names, are all back making their bids for laughs, (But I did meet a girl who was thrilled that the Lampoon Playboy parody had put Chagrin Falls, Ohio, on the map.) As for the worst offense -- well, the incomparable Max Beerbohm once wrote of W. S. Gilbert that his "one notion of humorous prose was to use as many long words and as many formal constructions as possible -- a most tedious trick, much practiced by other Mid-Victorian writers." Three Lampoon pieces are guilty...
However, Tom LaFarge's articles are clever and sometimes touching. He has an eye for the incisive detail that can paint an instant picture--a "jade-rimmed pince-nez," an "ivory ping-pong table" -- but sometimes he starts cataloguing trivia. With sparser details and stronger endings, his stories will be gems. Conn Nugent's revelation that Harvard football victories depress the economy is off-beat and has an angle--the sort of amusing fact-twisting that the Yale Record is more inclined to do, but very welcome in the Lampoon...
...there are extremes, but is it bad that the people of this society are concerned enough to take the time for self-examination and the thought to criticize those around them? Socrates said that "the unexamined life is not worth living." As for those who are concerned with ridiculous trivia, they are wasting their time. But, as for those who really are trying to better themselves by self-examination and to help those around them with well-placed words of advice, I say, more power to them...
...will pass. He believes that his mythical titled parents are on watch and will claim him as their own once he passes the test of haute Kultur. He becomes a culture grind, slaving ardently at French cooking, memorizing the Almanack de Gotha, and mentally building a pyramid of ancient trivia...