• The new Andrew Bird album (Noble Beast) came in the mail yesterday, a full week in advance of its in-store debut. It’s terrific. And I applaud the structure: the first song is titled “Oh No” and the final song (which bears some resemblance to the first) is called “On Ho.”

    • The media reports of yesterday’s truly impressive A320 ditching on the Hudson continue to praise the heroic actions of “the pilot.” Doesn’t everyone know by now that such airplanes always have two pilots?

    • Making up fancy-sounding names for small, medium, and large drinks is a trend that has to stop now. I noticed that Panera (ugh) has a coffee size called “largo.” We know from music class that “largo” is Italian for “broadly.” Care to guess which size cup that makes it?