Bull Durham: I hold onto this opinion, rendered two years ago. But note a few other meaningful details: the presence of a grizzled old (actually 32) Kevin Costner falling for a (nine years older) Susan Sarandon, who convincingly play as equals. Note that everyone gets a happy-ish ending, which is less about handing them everything they want than giving them some measure of dignity (Millie getting married, Nuke learning to behave like an adult and realize he doesn't know everything). Note also--very unusual for a comedy these days--the profusion of jokes and humorous moments, which go from runners to dialogue to wordplay to physical comedy. I like its vision of North Carolina, and of Durham, which plays less as "run-down old place nobody wants to be" and more as "the timelessness of these things in the midst of a very specific time functions as a metaphor for baseball itself"; it's definitely the 80s, but you'd never know it.

How Southern Drivers Become Unable to Cope With Snow

Snow is in the forecast for Durham this weekend, and though it will most assuredly not happen, I thought I'd share this story from last winter:

On a Sunday morning last year, I was making the decision about whether or not to go to church. Though the odds of precipitation were low, there was a very small chance of ice or snow while I was in the service. As a driver who learned to drive in the midwest, I have no fear of snow or ice and total confidence in my ability to navigate them. This is true even in Durham, where the winter road preparations are, let's say, haphazard: the city at least owns snow plows, salt, and brine, even if it shows little understanding of how to use them.

No, the real problem is the other drivers. The first year I was here, Durham received a quarter-inch of snow, and the local news featured stories of people who ran out of gas at intersections because no one would even attempt to drive. Last year, we had a snow of 2-4 inches that fell in the afternoon, and caused chaos. Admittedly, the storm came on quickly, getting the first half inch in about an hour. The preferred solution for many drivers was to abandon their cars by the side of the road or, when needed, in the road itself.

Faced with the possibility of drivers like these, I did the only sensible thing and decided to stay home.

And that is how to take a northern driver and turn him into a southerner who is afraid to go out because it might snow.

There's good trash-talk between rival schools ("State is the Art Garfunkel of Michigan colleges" was and remains my favorite). This is not that, which poorly manipulates both crime statistics and logic to make Chapel Hill seem like a place worlds better than Durham, which was not true even in 2004 when Durham was still kind of terrible.* The Duke Chronicle's response is mature and thoughtful. Duke 1, UNC 0.


*If nothing else, Durham is 4-5x bigger, with all the positive network effects that implies.

Things I do not miss even slightly about Central New Jersey this one's just on Princeton:

The place I am staying for my old Program's annual conference this week has a "Dress Code and Policies" tab on its website. It has been almost a year now since I've had to worried about whether I'm sufficiently well-dressed to be somewhere.*


*The south, among its many other virtues, accepts a significantly more laid back approach to appearance. If I were to show up to most any academic event in a suit, the odds are good that I'd be the only one. I am aware that there are restaurants in Princeton where they'd look askance if I wasn't wearing a tie; the nicest restaurants in Durham (probably nicer than those in Princeton, FWIW) would look askance at you if you were.

This. So many times this. Central New Jersey has all the price inflation you'd expect of a rural area with lots of high-level professionals that's close(ish) to Manhattan and houses a major research university, and yet there are all sorts of little, unexpected ways that things end up being yet more expensive than that. I could never figure it out. Even if money is no object for you, there's no shortage of inefficiencies that persevere for no discernible reason.


(I could never, for example, figure out why approximately half of the food establishments insisted you pay with cash; I literally never have cash on me in Durham because there's no need for it.)

Becky pointed me to this map of Durham in 1937, pointing out which neighborhoods have been segregated. Durham in the present day is notorious for having very, very nice neighborhoods right next to very poor neighborhoods without much in the way of transitional area. What I found most interesting is how closely the map ties into my 2004-2012 ideas of dodgy neighborhoods: Walltown north of Duke East Campus is clearly visible; as is the neighborhood east of Duke's West Campus and around Maplewood Cemetery; Forest Hills is white but adjacent St. Theresa's is black, which persists to this day and the somewhat controversial destruction of a pedestrian bridge between the two neighborhoods in 2010 or so; and East Durham as a whole more than West Durham. A good object lesson that things change more slowly than we believe--or not at all.

One of my in-real-life friends* is opening up a cafe in downtown Durham. I am relieved to have someplace different to go for all my coffee-consuming needs.


*Friend-of-a-friend, maybe, but I feel like when you've been to multiple Seders together, and recognize each other when you're out, that probably qualifies as just friends.

One of my very good friends in Durham traded in his car for a commuter bike and is now blogging about it. Primarily of interest to those who are interested in Durham, but recommended highly.