But don't French people think of French as an ethnicity? The best, most obvious one, but I think there's a weird erasing of "culture" here, what with the (also problematic) "melting pot."

I prefer Food Borg, Jesse.

Yeah, it's totally problematic. I don't know if the French in France think of themselves as ethnic, but as the default. Oh hey! I can go ask a French person. She's down the hall.

Ethnic is a weird word -- but what about culture? I think most Americans really don't think of the default culture here as being "a culture," when it totally is.

Do you guys feel a little off-kilter about the huge amount of major press Joss is getting?

I don't know if I'm reacting to what you are, but I think it's cool. It's like, we've loved him for so long thanks to Buffy et al, but now the rest of the world will get to see what he can do.

They had a five-man horn section (which made me laugh: they need FIVE people to replace the Big Man!), including Jake Clemons, Clarence's nephew, on sax.

Aw! Sounds like a great show, Consuela.

Chatty!co-worker (who was responsible for the whole " 'ethnic food' is a racist term!" argument) said "Every food is an ethnic food. Macaroni and cheese is the food of a specific ethnicity; you [specifically meaning me] just don't think it's exotic, so you don't call it 'ethnic'."

I asked him what ethnicity macaroni and cheese is from, and he said, "American." I said that was a nationality, not an ethnicity, so he quoted the dictionary definition of "ethnicity" at me, which -- in his dictionary, which is Webster's 10th, I think -- said "the fact or state of belonging to a social group that has a common NATIONAL or cultural tradition."

I can't win this one with him.

Having a banner week:

1. Debit card spoofed and $300.00 stolen from my account.
2. Broke my kindle
3. Went in to doctor - will need more tests (sigh)
4. Twitter account phished.

Silver lining: not much money in my acct because my tax refund was delayed.

sumi, your week so far is a great example of why we need do-overs. I hope it gets better soon.

Thank goodness my boss gave me the gift of dark chocolate truffles for Administrative Professionals Day.

Damn, sumi, you are due for something really nice. Truffles are a good start.

Hey Sophia, have you heard about this project?

Last week, eleven Magnum photographers descended on Rochester, New York, to document the city, though not in a traditional sense. Each photographer will explore themes related to his or her personal interests. Collectively, they will create an archive of Rochester at this moment in time. “House of Photos,” as this expedition is called, is a continuation of “Looking at America,” the agency’s ongoing collaboration, which kicked off last year when five photographers travelled from Austin, Texas to Oakland, California in an R.V.

Read more [link]

Steph, dictionary.com has one definition of ethinic as:

adj - . characteristic of another culture: the ethnic look ; ethnic food

also has chiefly ( US ), ( Austral ) a member of an ethnic group, esp a minority group