Silly Season

"Silly Season, LFTV, and Howard Leland"
Loonfoot Falls Chronicle-Gazette (August 20, 2010)

"Ever notice how, in August, you're more likely to see news about, say, off street parking or prize beagles on the front page? It's called the silly season. I read a post on Boston.com about this phenomenon: what Miriam Webster online says is 'a period (as late summer) when the mass media often focus on trivial or frivolous matters for lack of major news stories.'..."

This is another shameless plug for another blog. It's not the first time I've done a micro-review on one of my own posts. (August 8, 2010)

That "silly season" post in Loonfoot Falls Chronicle-Gazette is mostly about one of the fictional Minnesota town's more eccentric citizens, Howard Leland.

Now, about what another fellow wrote on Boston.com:

---

"August: The media's Silly Season"
Mark Leccese, Gatekeeper, Boston.com (August 19, 2010)

"Come August, the institutions to which the media devotes most if its time and toil are closed and gone fishin' — the government, the schools, the courts, big business. All that's left is the Red Sox and Tom Brady's unfortunate haircut.

"The British media, for 150 years, have been calling August the Silly Season, defined by Merriam Webster Online as 'a period (as late summer) when the mass media often focus on trivial or frivolous matters for lack of major news stories.'

"Two examples:

"* As of noon on Thursday, Google News listed 2,940 articles — that's right, from 2,940 different news outlets — on Brett Favre reporting to the training camp of the NFL's Minnesota Vikings.

"* A scant 833 articles from 833 different news outlets reported that Aerosmith front man Steven Tyler has been chosen (through what rigorous screening process I don't know) as a judge on 'American Idol.'

"Here in Boston, the fervor to report every last available detail and every response to the jail suicide of so-called Craigslist Killer Philip Markoff continues with Silly Season abandon...."

There's more. I think it helps if you live in the Boston area: but you'll probably enjoy reading what Mark Leccese has to say even if you've never been east of Kansas City.

The Lemming did, anyway.

And you'll learn a bit more of the phenomenon that's partly responsible for an outsize rat-thing being international news, earlier this month. (August 20, 2010)