There weren’t enough good ones last month to merit an entry, but we’re back with a handful of phrases that people entered into search engines that, by hook or by crook, led them here.

*liane hansen will shortz affair blog* — … and innumerable variations of those words and similar ones. (My favorite is ‘puzzle master true love blog’.) Obviously most of those searches are finding “this”:http://www.polytropos.org/archives/000536.html, but what I want to know is, are these people who heard the mention on NPR and tried to find the blog, or are these people who (like me) have always suspected the connection and were searching _before_ last Sunday? I suspect more of the latter.

*best backgammon player in the world* — Don’t listen to all this talk of Woolsey or Robertie or Magriel. _We_ know that it’s “Patrick”:http://www.polytropos.org/archives/000336.html. Who I haven’t seen since “June”:http://www.polytropos.org/archives/000456.html, sad to say.

*nude picture sault ste marie* — Mmmm, yeah, ’cause the “Soo Locks”:http://www.exploringthenorth.com/soo/locks.html are so sexy, opening and closing, opening and closing …

*david vanderlaan picture* — He has a really cute butt. I know. (No, not “this”:http://cechg.freeservers.com/david.html David. “This”:http://www.polytropos.org/mt-static/ella/ella155.jpg one.)

*polytropos obligatory search string excerpts* — Aaaah! It’s so meta I can’t stand it!

Man, I’m in a good mood.

First of all, big kudos to Jim Lehrer for asking a batch of excellent questions. The ‘character’ question was the only dud—all the other ones were strong and specifically difficult for the person who was being asked. Both candidates, of course, did a mix of direct answering and dodging.

I was worried about Kerry, but he did fine. A few times he answered off message, but overall he had a solid demeanor, and more importantly, he stayed strong and consistent on Iraq, defused the flip-flop meme, and gave a lot of solid answers. I leapt for joy when he came out with the “you can be certain but be wrong” bit. And there were a lot of moments like that.

On CBS and NBC, anyway, Bush got reamed by the split screens—his half-sneer while listening to Kerry’s replies didn’t come off well. He had any number of awkward pauses before unveiling very basic words and phrases. And his answers were more bogged down in generalizations than Kerry’s.

I had barely half an ear open for the talking head spin, post-debate. On NBC they just talked to Karen Hughes and now they’re talking to Mike McCurry—what in Sam Hill is the point, exactly? You know what you’re going to get from these folks. Good grief, people, there are enough pundits out there who are able to summon a modicum of non-partisanship when commentating on events like this. Talk to them instead.

All in all, a clear Kerry win.

UPDATE: Some more thoughts, before I go read what everybody else wrote …

Both candidates came back a little too often to the core talking points, even when it wasn’t germane to the question. But for Bush those talking points lacked teeth, and it showed. The message he ended up hammering home re: Iraq was that saying “wrong war, wrong way, wrong time” was in and of itself somehow inappropriate to utter, because of the “message” that it sends. But he’s saying that at a time when a clear majority of people have come around to agree with that notion, or at the very least that it was a good idea, badly executed. And we tread dangerously close here to the notion that “dissent is unpatriotic,” which is nonsense, and which tends to slide, in the view of extremists, to “dissent is traitorous” or “dissent emboldens the enemy.” This is a shaky position to keep coming back to, and I don’t think doing so did him any favors.

Kerry had to strain to put a good face on Iraq, because even if he wins, the situation is likely to get worse before it gets better, and now he’ll be on record as saying that he could fix it, which he can’t.

Did I mention how good Lehrer’s questions were? Man, they were good. I liked the “greatest threat” one, and Kerry was rock-solid for his answer: “nuclear proliferation” right off the bat. But in the thirty second follow-ups, both candidates pulled a little waffle when Lehrer asked for clarification. Bush said “nuclear proliferation … inthehandsofterrorists” and Kerry said “nuclear proliferation … andotherweaponsofmassdestruction.” Not that there’s anything super problematic with either of those clarifications—it was just a shame that he was so forceful at the outset and then lost it. Which happened to both of them quite a bit, frankly.

Hurm … this is what I get for not taking notes. Bush had more little missteps, like the pauses and the sneers, but overall was still a canny debater. It happened at least twice that Kerry was talking and we who were watching were saying “If Bush is smart, he’ll come back with yadda yadda,” and sure enough, right on his turn, Bush lays in with “yadda yadda.” But it wasn’t enough, because Kerry was unflappable, and Bush definitely flapped.

Gah. As luck would have it I can’t access Polytropos to post this stuff. So by the time I post it I will have read what other people have said, and may even link to some of it below. But I solemnly swear that all the preceding was uttered before I was spinfluenced in any way.

UPDATE: Hmm, slim pickins when it comes to the immediate response crowd. Isn’t this supposed to be the blogospinosphere or something, all lightning-quick and outrageous?

Josh Marshall’s first thoughts are worth a peek—he makes the good point that Kerry was on the offensive the whole time. Bush parried enough of his attacks to satisfy his supporters, certainly, but he never turned the tables and put Kerry on the defensive. (On an unrelated note, also see JMM on how Allawi’s speech was worked on by the Bush campaign. Yes, you read that right. Not just the White House. The Bush campaign.)

Jim is good his the last paragraph on the stuff that neither candidate mentioned.

Note to Steve Clemons: You’re one of my favorite bloggers these days, and I eagerly look forward to your post-debate thoughts tomorrow. But cool it with the name-dropping.

I even made a rare journey to Instapundit to see what the other side might have to say. The best he can muster so far is a quick note that Gergen on CNN referred to the debate as a “draw.” Same general impression from NRO online. If they in any sense could have called it a Bush win, they would have.

More links tomorrow.

UPDATE: As promised, a few more links:

Matthew Yglesias has a good summary of responses from a variety of American Prospect writers.

Saletan and Kaplan are both reliably good in Slate.

Steve Clemons’ analysis is every bit as good as I hoped it would be.

On the conservative end, coverage at LGF is telling—the best they can muster is to try to make some hay out of Kerry’s “global test” line, and this little gem:

Isn�t it a little silly to talk about who �won� the presidential debate?

It’s so nice to win for once …

Common Grounds has been my favorite place in the neighborhood, ever since it opened over three and a half years ago. In its salad days it was the Platonic ideal of a coffee shop, miraculously manifested in our dim world of shadows. When I first ambled in there with a stack of papers to grade, the day after it opened, all I was looking for was the sort of thing I look for in any coffee shop: decent java, cheap refills, good ambience and music, a table to call my own. But Common Grounds brought more: great music, plenty of room, (eventually) wireless Internet, and most important of all, good people.

The ‘good people’ bit freaked me out at first, I’ll admit. Within a few weeks of going there regularly, Aaron had asked me all about the class I was teaching, Carrie had given me a mix tape, and Brad had bequeathed to me an industrial-sized can of cranberry sauce. I bristled the first time Brad forced me into meeting somebody else sitting quietly on the other side of the coffee shop with his own laptop—the whole ‘forging a community’ thing seemed a bit cheesy, and I just wanted to get my work done. But he wasn’t doing it because it was part of some big community-forging plan; he was doing it because he thought we might get along, and of course he turned out to be perfectly right. In the end the community happened, not because it was forced, but because the people behind the counter were just being themselves, and that was enough. These things build up their own momentum—none of the people who worked there in the beginning are still around, but the mark they left is indelible. Others have carried it on. I’ve been one of the lucky ones, a regular’s regular, plugged in to the whole scene—I have a sizable passel of friends now who I met at the Grounds, from both sides of the counter. But even for those who don’t take their coffee shops as seriously as I do, the fact that Common Grounds was the kind of place where that that sort of thing could happen meant that it had that hard-to-pin-down trait—let’s call it “hearth”—that everyone can feel. It’s not actually all that complicated. You can sense if a place has it or not right when you walk through the door, by looking at the people sitting around and noticing whether they seem at home, and the people behind the counter and whether they give a damn about the place where they’re at. Decor and music count too, and coffee, but not as much.

Yeah, I’m getting all nostalgic, but there’s a reason: Common Grounds is going away. In a few weeks it’ll have new owners and a new name: Murky Coffee. For the occasional visitors the differences may seem slight. Heck, all they have to do is keep selling coffee and keep the free Internet and most folks will keep coming back. But will the new place have any sense of hearth?

That’s not a question that can be answered until it’s up and running under new management, but the signs so far are troubling. Take, for example, the letter from the new owner, Nick, posted by the counter:

Dear valued Common Grounds customer,

There’s no easy way to say this, but here it goes: We would like to formally announce that within the next few weeks, Common Grounds Coffee and Tea House will cease operations. In its place will open “murky coffee arlington.”

We started murky coffee in a tiny spot on Wisconsin Avenue in Georgetown in 2002. We quickly gained notoriety as the hands-down best coffee in all of Washington, DC, with many baristas from other coffee shops around the city coming to us for what emerged to be the only real espresso in DC.

Currently, we have a thriving shop right next to Eastern Market in the Capitol Hill neighborhood. Coffee-lovers from all around have been coming to experience what can only be called, “The next level of coffee and espresso.”

Featuring the amazing, everything-from-scratch breakfast pastries from Hawthorne Fine Breakfast Pastries of Severna Park, Maryland, coffee from Mayorga Coffee Roasters in Rockville, and the renowned Malabar Gold espresso from Josuma Coffee Company in California, we have definitely lived up to our motto, “Totally committed to serving the people of Washington the best damn coffee there is… Yes, we said ‘damn’”

Common Grounds has proven to be a very important place for a lot of people, and please be assured that we are very sensitive and respectful of that relationship. We hope that you’ll like what we’re going to be doing here, and we welcome your feedback. We can be reached at cg@murkycoffee.com, and be sure to check out our website at www.murkycoffee.com, where we’ll be posting more information about the transition in the future.

Thanks, and God bless!
Nick & Suzy Cho
murky coffee

From a rhetorical perspective, this letter is a disaster. Presumably its intent is to announce the change to CG regulars, answer their questions, and assuage their anxiety. But the bulk of it is dedicated to an extended brag about the quality of murky’s coffee. “The only real espresso in DC” implies that everyone else’s, including the espresso of the Common Grounds we know and love, isn’t real. The motto conveys two ideas, both of which are wrong: 1) the quality of the coffee is the most important thing about a coffee shop; 2) “Oooo! We used a swear word!” is an amusing component of a business motto. The words of assurance, which should have been right there in the beginning, are found in the last paragraph. All in all, the message of the letter is “Ho boy! Things are gonna change around here!” It says not “we hope you’ll keep coming here,” but rather “We hope that you’ll like what we’re going to be doing here.”

Admittedly, my reaction to the letter is colored by the comments that followed it on the website:

I’d like to welcome the customers of Common Grounds to our website. Change, the sort that is coming to ‘The Grounds,’ is never as smooth or as easy as we’d like. All we can really say is, we took over our current location that was a place called “Stompin’ Grounds,” a place not unlike Common Grounds in many ways.

We were able to transform a beloved coffeeshop that served BAD coffee, mediocre baked-goods, and had a somewhat aimless character, into a MORE beloved place with the best coffee in the city, the best baked-goods, and a ‘vibe’ that people love. We want everything to be the best, because we truly care about people… and people deserve the best. Don’t you? Aren’t you a people?

Feel free to e-mail us anytime with questions or comments. We’re pretty good about getting back to people that way. Cool?

You have to read that pretty carefully to realize that he isn’t actually calling Common Grounds a place with bad coffee, mediocre baked goods, and aimless character—he’s only implying it.

So here’s my open letter to Nick:

Dear Nick,

There is a very slim chance that you will be able make your new place every bit as good a coffee shop as Common Grounds has been. I’m certainly rooting for you. But I’m concerned that you think that because you know coffee—which I will take on faith that you do—you’ve got it all figured out. Remember that you’re taking over a rare, wonderful place, and that you should walk lightly.

Go to Pittsburgh. Look up Brad & Carrie. Bring brownies. Ask them—no, beg them—to tell you how they did it. Listen carefully. Take notes. Then, when you get back to D.C., bake up some more brownies and take them to Aaron and Liz and do the same thing. Be kind and attentive to the current employees—who you are making re-apply for their jobs, a very bad sign—and remember that their morale is the single most important key to your success. Without that, you can have the best coffee in the whole wide world and it won’t be worth a fig.

Sincerely,

Nate Bruinooge

UPDATE: Nick has updated the Murky Coffee site with a clarification of his original letter and comments. (A direct link isn’t working for some reason.) It sets a much better tone and makes me a bit more hopeful about CG/Murky’s future.

That does it. I’m giving up on America.

The impetus (this time) seems innocuous enough — a “CNN article”:http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/TV/09/28/comedy.politics/index.html (hat tip to David Groen) that reports (unsurprisingly) that viewers of “The Daily Show” scored better on a political quiz than viewers of “The Tonight Show” or “Late Night”. Where it gets appalling is in the “quiz” that was offered as part of a larger survey, and in the results. The quiz only consists of six multiple-choice questions; on five of them the choices are “Bush” and “Kerry.” Here it is:

1. Who favors allowing workers to invest some of their Social Security contributions in the stock market?
2. Who urged Congress to extend the federal law banning assault weapons?
3. John Kerry says that he would eliminate the Bush tax cuts on those making how much money?

* Over $50,000 a year
* Over $100,000 a year
* Over $200,000 a year
* Over $500,000 a year

4. Who is a former prosecutor?
5. Who favors making the recent tax cuts permanent?
6. Who wants to make it easier for labor unions to organize?

How is it possible to get any of these questions _wrong_? Four of them require only the most elementary knowledge about party positions. One requires only basic biographical information about the candidates. The hardest question of them all features a number that’s been used widely in Kerry’s speeches and campaign material.

So it’s a stupid quiz, so what? The _results_ are so what. At the end of the “Take the Quiz Online!” feature on CNN’s website, they cheerfully inform you how well the actual survey-takers did. Here are the averages:

“The Daily Show” with Jon Stewart viewers – 3.59 correct
“The Tonight Show” with Jay Leno viewers – 2.95 correct
“Late Show” with David Letterman viewers – 2.91 correct
No late-night comedy viewing – 2.62 correct

So on average, most people got less than half the answers correct. That’s appalling. The good news is that it’s appalling and also somewhat suspect — the article reports on some other numbers:

Forty-nine percent of Leno and Letterman viewers got a perfect score on the quiz. But 60 percent of “Daily Show” viewers answered all six questions correctly. Just 42 percent of those who read a newspaper four days a week aced the test. Only 40 percent of those who watch network news four days a week got every answer right.

If nearly half the L&L watchers got all the answers right, but the average for those people was to get a little less than half the answers right, wouldn’t that mean that the other half of those viewers would have had to — almost universally — get all the answers _wrong_? But it doesn’t matter — if even if the figures for averages are completely bogus, and only the percentages of acers are accurate, they results still suck royally, and suggest a woefully uninformed populace.

The other possibility is that, just as the quiz questions were stupid, the entire survey is critically flawed in some way that renders all the results meaningless. Here hopin’.

UPDATE: In the comments, Nevin notes that the article has been corrected — 60% of Daily Show viewers didn’t get a perfect score, but rather, the average score was 60%. In other words, the inconsistency has been resolved in the direction of even _more_ ignorance on the part of viewers.

Sigh.

The second-most surprising thing about the response to Take You Out For Sushi … is the sheer number of people who agree with me. The Hansen-Shortz liaison has been a pet theory of mine for years, but judging from all the emails and comments I’ve received, it’s a notion that is widely shared — indeed, I think it’s fair to say that I didn’t express an opinion so much as I channeled a gestalt observation on behalf of NPR listeners everywhere.

The most surprising thing, of course, is that Liane Hansen herself somehow got wind of my blog post and mentioned it on this week’s show . Though she didn’t mention Polytropos by name, I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that no other blog wrote about the possibility of an affair between them last week that also contained speculation about that affair’s impending demise.

First off, a couple replies to others’ comments. To Jonathan, who refers to the incident as my “fifteen minutes” of fame: Good Lord, I hope not! I mean, I wasn’t even mentioned by name! I’m holding out for an ATC interview with Melissa Block, at the very least. And to Jim, who wrote in the comments, “it’s amazing that Liane ever read or heard of this. I’d love to know how that happened if you ever find out”- Jim, why is it so surprising that I count NPR hosts among my regular readers? Surely they number in the thousands … hundreds … dozens … well, OK, I admit I was rather surprised. As for how Liane found out about it, I think we’re left with two options:

1. She’s the sort of person who obsessively Googles her own name on a daily basis.
2. Someone told her about the entry.

I’m leaning toward the latter, so if anyone’s willing to fess up, Jim (and I) would appreciate it.

But on to business! I promised to report on any further developments in this story, and this certainly counts as a development, so let’s get right to the analysis of the transcript! (My comments, as before, are in brackets.)

LIANE: … and joining us is Puzzle Master Will Shortz. Hi Will … [the difference in tone between her greeting this week and last is striking — Liane’s usual ebullience is missing]

WILL: Hi Liane!

LIANE: Guess what.

WILL: What’s that?

LIANE: We have become a rumor on the Internet …

WILL:

LIANE: … I swear- I found a blog [the way she says ‘blog’ makes it sound as if she found a strange creature in her basement], and a gentleman [the first time I’ve ever been referred to as a gentleman] is writing, and is convinced that we are conducting an illicit affair — and not only conducting an illicit affair, but that there’s trouble , and we soon may be breaking up. I … I … you have to know, if we’re having an affair I figured you should know.

WILL: Well, let’s keep this a secret from your husband Neil.

LIANE: Let’s do that, shall we? Well, maybe we could consider it an affair of the mind …

WILL: There we go …

LIANE: … that we conduct every week, and that involves doing these amazing puzzles that you give us, and you left us with a challenge …

If you listen, it’s pretty clear that Liane was springing this stuff on Will on the air- under the circumstances, I’d say he handled it pretty well. Kudos to Liane, too, for making the whole thing into a bit of light humor, and thus defusing what could have been an explosive revelation. This confirms my suspicion from last week that their affair is coming to an end — clearly, she means for this exchange to serve as a sort of coda to their symphony of frustrated love. Will, I must say, doesn’t come off as being particularly upset- maybe he’s had a chance to come to terms with it all, or maybe he’s just really good at hiding his true feelings.

The drama isn’t over, though — careful listeners may have picked up on something at the end of the segment:

LIANE: Will, I’m going to have to get this answer on the radio next Sunday- I’m going to be at the beach … and Sheila Kast will be sitting in here, and I know she’s dying to play the game, so you’ll meet her …

“Dying to play the game,” indeed! Is Liane trying to set Will up with someone else? We’ll all have to tune in next week to know for sure …

Those may be the best three words I’ve heard all year. That’s how much “additional footage”:http://www.lordoftherings.net/homevideo/homevideo.html the extended version will have (via “Slashdot”:http://slashdog.org). It fills me with hope, beccause 50 minutes sounds like enough to give it “what it needed”:http://www.polytropos.org/archives/000222.html — enough to make an even bigger improvement than “its predecessor”:http://www.polytropos.org/archives/000168.html enjoyed.

Pre-orders start on October 1. Release date isn’t until November, which right now seems a long, long way away …

In “Part I”:http://www.polytropos.org/archives/000407.html I reported a surprisingly painless shopping experience. And, having given it a couple weeks, I am pleased to report that the mattress itself is not only painless but pretty darn comfortable.

On a Tuesday morning two guys in a delivery van came on up. One carried the mattress and the other the box-spring, single handedly. Having spent quite a bit of time wrestling the old mattress and box spring out of the bed and pushing them against the wall, I don’t know how they _do_ that. I imagine it’s a similar principle to lugging a baby around: sure, they’re pretty heavy, but they’re a lot less heavy when you’re used to it and know exactly the right way to hold ’em.

One awful thing about the mattress business is that manufacturers are actually allowed to sell you a “new” mattress that contains used parts. (That’s why mattress retailers are always perfectly happy to relieve you of your old mattress when they deliver a new one.) By law any such mattress must have a red label on it indicating that it contains used material, so your shadier mattress delivery types will drop off the mattress in its thick plastic wrapping and skeedaddle, leaving you to wrest it out and discover the red tag on your own. These guys weren’t like that, though — they whipped out the boxcutters and de-plasticized the mattress and boxspring in brief, efficient gestures, and then placed them neatly on the bed. No red labels. Then they hauled the old ones out and just like that — poof! — they were gone.

Anyway, two weeks in and the acclimation period is pretty much done. Firmness is good. Suanna and I both sleep better on it. It’s especially nice how comfy it is to sleep on my side on it, which is usually how I end up. The best part is that it’s firm right up to the edge, so even though it’s the same size it ultimately provides a little more sleeping room. We ended up getting a Serta, even though Sealy generally came better-recommended, because the Sertas tended to be firmer and this was the one that just fit. I forget the exact name — “Castle” something-or-other, though that tells you almost nothing because the exact same mattress could go by a completely different name when sold somewhere else. And at a wildly different price, for that matter — just another fun fact about the wild world of mattresses, which I’m happy to be quit of for a decade or so, none the worse for wear.

The days of monthly blogroll updates are long gone, but I’ve made enough changes just now that it’s worth calling attention to them.

* Two new blogs join the “Friends” ‘roll: “Smithical”:http://www.smithical.com/index.asp and “Steg’s Music Seminary”:http://scottsteg.blogspot.com/. Steg still has his regular Livejournal, too, but a music-dedicated blog from him is definitely a welcome thing. Just as soon as he adds some actual entries, that is.
* Ed is taking a break from blogging, so the Blog That Goes Ping is no longer pinging. I’m standing right here, holding a candle and waiting for your return, Ed!
* We now have an all-political Top 5, thanks in part to the election season, no doubt. The newcomer to the short list is “Matthew Yglesias”:http://yglesias.typepad.com/matthew/. I’m pretty sure that the only reason he hasn’t shown up there before now is my unconscious assumption that anyone as young as he is can’t be _that_ bright. But he is. I’ve finally made peace with that fact.
* Those honored Top 5 spots are always in flux, though. “Jim”:http://www.highclearing.com/, who was a permanent Top 5 fixture, lost his standing when he want on hiatus — will he have what it takes to get it back? How does “Josh Marshall”:http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/ feel about being left out when “Kevin”:http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/ and Matt, the other members of the Smart Liberal Triumvirate, bask in Top 5 fame and glory — and is he plotting revenge? Only time will tell …
* UPDATE: Late addition to the blogroll: Sara Zuiderveen’s “A Little More Life”:http://www.alittlemorelife.net/weblog/. A new blog from the mix CD goddess. Check it out.

(sung to the tune of “Another Saturday Night”)

Another diverted flight ‘cause my name’s on a watchlist
I just got busted by the TSA
Oh how I wish I’d just stayed home in London
We’re goin’ to Bangor, Maine

I used to be a singer
Creator of such pleasant sounds
But ever since my conversion
Seems there’s always a diversion
On na-tion-al se-cur-i-ty grounds

CHORUS

I never funded Hamas
Those guys just get me really pissed
Though I must admit I’m guilty
For sayin’ stuff ‘bout Salman Rushdie
That don’t make me a terrorist

CHORUS

The thing that really bugs me:
Can I be all that big of a threat?
When there’s cold cats like Osama
Or lib-e-rals like B. Obama
That George Bush would much rather get

Oo! Aah!

Another diverted flight ‘cause my name’s on watchlist
I just got busted by the TSA
Oh how I wish I’d just stayed home in London
We’re goin’ to Bangor, ooh, we’re goin’ to Bangor
Landin’ in Bangor, ooh, we’re goin’ to Bangor
Welcome to Bangor, we’re here in Bangor, Maine

I have long suspected that Liane Hansen, host of NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday, and Will Shortz, puzzle editor of the New York Times and Weekend Edition puzzle master, have been carrying on a steamy affair. It may be that “affair” isn’t the right word — I don’t know if either of them are married — but the perky enthusiasm with which Liane greets Will every week on the show poorly conceals her fascination — nay, obsession— with his formidable intellect, among other things. Will, it’s clear, is the kind of guy who has difficulty expressing his emotions, so it’s a little harder to pick up the signals on his end, but if you’ve listened to the show long enough, you can’t deny that he brims with an ineffable desire that even the master of wordplay cannot express in language. I mean, come on, just look at them — the way his arm wraps around her, the way her head inclines in his direction, both blissfully savoring one of those rare moments when they’re together.

Of course, their love can never be. Setting aside the fact that one or both of them may have a family, there’s that great gulf between them: one is in New York, the other in D.C., and both are too committed to their careers to give them up just to be together. They are left with those excruciating, blissful moments when their souls touch across the airwaves, and those all-too-rare opportunities to meet face to face when one happens to be in the other’s neck of the woods.

Judging from their exchange on the show this morning, the tensions of their illicit love are coming to the fore. Is this the beginning of the end? Here’s a transcript of this morning’s segment, with comments:

LIANE: … and joining us is Puzzle Master Will Shortz! Hi Will!

WILL: Hi Liane. Missed you on your trip to New York.

LIANE: Oh, I know! I didn’t get to hook up with you this time — yeah, I took a very quick trip to New York, mainly to go to Carnegie Hall … [she provides an overlong explanation of why she was in NYC for just a little bit, masking the tension with unnecessary detail; all Will utters during her monologue is a simple ‘yeah’ that clearly communicates his disappointment] … it was a lot of fun and I enjoyed it, but I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to take you out for sushi again [euphemism?], but we’ll have to do that the next time I come up, I promise…

WILL: [skeptically] Next time.

LIANE: Excellent, excellent …

It seems that perhaps Liane has decided to disengage, and that Will isn’t going to take it all that well. This is surprising, in that through the years Liane has seemed (on the air, anyway) to be the more interested party. Maybe it’s for the best, although I must confess that if they call off their affair a good bit of the drama of Weekend Edition will be lost. Needless to say, I’ll continue to monitor the situation closely and report any further developments.

UPDATE: Whatever you do, don’t miss the further developments.