American Girls are Turning 40

My college-age daughter caught the American Girl wave somewhere around its peak or shortly thereafter, and it was more of accident, as she inherited a couple dolls from the older sister of her older brother's best friend (that's not as convoluted as it sounds). And while we never signed on to the type of hysteria that led to elaborate tea parties with the dolls and friends at the local "American Girl Boutique" -- yes, we had one in suburban Denver -- we certainly had a bit of a run with the biggest doll craze since Barbie and, of course, "Cabbage Patch" dolls in the 80s. 

And, I must admit, I was a bit intrigued, even impressed with the "story behind the craze," especially because there was always a story. Behind a doll with a theme written on the box, each doll came with a fully developed narrative in a book. And, amusingly, my son being the voracious reader he was actually read all the American Girl doll books. Truly, the stories weren't mere fluff, and at least for a time, for some, the stories and themes of the dolls were intended to impart decent lessons, history, even culture.

So, I was quite intrigued to read that American Girl is turning forty this year. A couple of culture writers for the WashPost recently delved into the history with the story:  "American Girls are Turning 40: Just like the Millennials Who Loved Them":

Our foreheads aren’t as smooth as theirs, and our eyes crinkle at the edges, but here, in this raspberry-hued temple to girlhood that is the American Girl flagship in New York, we feel 10 years old, too. All of the beautiful dresses, the miniature accessories, the luscious hair to brush and braid: American Girlhood is middle-aged, but it is also eternal.

When we were 10, American Girl and its dolls taught us about loyalty, bravery and moxie. Samantha. Felicity. Molly. Addy. Kirsten. Josefina. If you are of a certain age, just those names will conjure their stories of Colonial Williamsburg, the Underground Railroad and the Minnesota frontier.

“When American Girl was founded, it was really to put girls in the center of the story with characters their own age,” says Jamie Cygielman, global head of dolls at Mattel, which acquired the company in 1998. At the time, the brand was a revelation. Baby dolls made girls into mothers. Barbies were aspirational, fashionable adults. But American Girls were exactly our age, living out their lives in some of the most pivotal moments in history — and doing so with courage, conviction and adorable, collectible accessories.

We’ve been thinking about those girls recently, as a few generational factors have coalesced. Millennial mothers on the cusp of 40 now have children old enough to age into the brand, and those who preserved their dolls are handing them down to their children. Meanwhile, their own childhood nostalgia is being sold as tiny artifacts, thanks to the addition of “historical” dolls from 1999 — the late 1900s, if you wish.

Jim Beam Bourbon/Whiskey Shuttering Production for 2026

Ok, now it's getting personal ... and a matter of American pride.

The trade war and the imposition of new tariffs have come for one of the most distinctly American of products -- as homegrown as the blues, jazz, and rock-n-roll -- bourbon. Bourbon is a uniquely American spirit in that it can only be made within the boundaries of the United States, much like sparkling white wine can only be called champagne if it comes from that specific wine growing region of France. And the world thirsts for American bourbon, most specifically the country of Canada. However, in a shocking news Jim Beam Distillery has announced it will cease new production of bourbon and whiskey for the entirety of 2026:

The maker of Jim Beam bourbon whiskey will halt production at its main site in Kentucky for all of 2026. The company said in a statement it would close its distillery in Clermont until it took the “opportunity to invest in site enhancements”.

“We are always assessing production levels to best meet consumer demand and recently met with our team to discuss our volumes for 2026,” it said.

It comes as whiskey distillers in the US face uncertainty around Donald Trump’s trade tariffs, as well as declining rates of alcohol consumption. In October, the Kentucky Distillers’ Association (KDA) trade body said there was a record amount of bourbon in warehouses across the state – more than 16m barrels.

One of the primary reasons for the halt in production is the Canadian market. Granted, other factors are contributing as well, mainly an overall decrease in alcohol consumption nationally and worldwide. 

"After celebrating a record year for U.S. spirits exports in 2024, this new data is very troubling for U.S. distillers,” DISCUS CEO Chris Swonge said in a press release. “Persistent trade tensions are having an immediate and adverse effect on U.S. spirits exports. There’s a growing concern that our international consumers are increasingly opting for domestically produced spirits or imports from countries other than the U.S., signaling a shift away from our great American spirits brands.” Sales are down, and that’s very bad news for one of the most iconic American bourbon brands, Jim Beam. The 230-year-old brand has decided to close down its distillery, which has been in regular operation since prohibition

• Trump’s trade war has particularly angered Canada, which has led to many Canadians boycotting American products.Swonger said nowhere is this shift more pronounced than in Canada, where U.S. spirits exports plummeted 85%, falling below $10 million in the second quarter of 2025.
• U.S. spirits sales in Canada declined 68% in April 2025, whereas sales of Canadian and other imported spirits rose around 3.6% each.
• Canada removed its retaliatory tariff on U.S. spirits on Sept. 1, but the majority of Provinces continue to ban American spirits from their shelves.
• Canada remains the only key trading partner to retaliate against U.S. spirits.

Hanukkah -- Eight Crazy Nights

This evening is the final night of Hannukah. 

So, in the words of Adam Sandler, "If you're the only kid in town without a Christmas tree, here's [two lists] of people who are Jewish just like you and me."

Green Day is Punk -- come at me

In reading the book, Smash! Green Day, The Offspring, Bad Religion, NOFX, and the '90s Punk Explosion by Ian Winwood, I was struck by the significance of 1994 in the history of punk, and I was reminded of just how animated people can be by discussions of punk. 

For example, when I posted about Green Day and punk, a friend quickly scoffed, "Pop-punk, maybe." That qualifier was clearly meant to demean and undercut any credibility of the band is being somehow inanthentic and truly "punk." In that regard, the slight seemed to be about the melodic, radio-friendly, and pop-based tone to the music. So, I countered: is Green Day's sound any more melodic than the Ramones? Or the Sex Pistols? Or the Clash? I'd argue not.

The primary criticism of a punk band not being authentically punk is rooted in the idea of "selling out." And that criticism is primarily based on the decision to sign with a major record label, which Green Day did in 1993 when they left Livermore's Lookout Records, where they recorded two albums, for Reprise Records whose release of Dookie went on to sell more than 20 million copies.

However, Green Day's roots in coming up the DIY way, cutting its teeth in the historic Gilman Street, discounts the petty criticism of major label signing. Obviously, the seminal punk bands like the Ramones, Sex Pistols, Clash, and more all worked with and released on major labels. And while the indie label scene wasn't as developed then, it still existed. And, of course, I think the definitive position on that issue comes from NOFX singer and founder of Fat Wreck Chords Fat Mike who asserts:

"Green Day didn't sell out. None of those bands did. They were playing their style of music, and it finally got popular. There was no selling out. Selling out is when you change your style to play music that people might like."

Finally, I would argue that Green Day put down one of the most politically charged punk rock manifestos when it released the pivotal 2000's protest LP American Idiot, which is nothing short of a scathing indictment of the hollow actions of the W Bush administration.

 

Can GenX Save the World?

Oh, Generation X. The forgotten middle child of the 20th century. Sandwiched between the Boomers and their offspring the Millennials, alongside the rise of Gen Z (a Generation X derivative, by the way), it has almost become a sport to note how many times GenX is overlooked in generational sociological writing, news, advertising, and more. 

And, yet, despite potentially being the first generation to not over attain the White House (oh, Paul Ryan, what happened to you?), Generation X is now in prime middle age, accounting for majorities in Congress and in state-level politics, yet yielding far fewer CEO's and name brand business leaders. That's the theme of a recent piece in the Washington Post from opinion writer Theo Johnson who suggests, that, for the first time since they were the first latch-key kids, "Gen Xers Have the Keys to the Kingdom Again":

For Gen X, few things signaled coming of age like a house key. It was a symbol of after-school autonomy beyond the watchful eyes of authority figures. This newfound independence was as much a gift as it was a necessity; the simultaneous rise of two-income households and divorce rates in the 1970s and ’80s meant empty homes on weekday afternoons, turning a generation of children into latchkey kids.

In our formative years, Gen Xers such as myself learned to handle matters on our own and became experts in tending to our parents’ things. Freedom came with responsibilities — the chores and homework, the watching over siblings and the not breaking stuff. But for a little part of each weekday, we had the keys to the kingdom.

Now middle-aged, this generation is increasingly in charge of a country in which just 17 percent of Americans have faith in government. More than 80 percent of Americans believe democracy is in crisis or facing serious challenges. The sensible step for a nation feeling this way is to undertake fundamental reforms and improve the government’s design and structure, which generations before us have done and the majority of Americans support. Instead, there’s a crippling deference to authority, the status quo and the long-standing structures of democracy, which are behaving like partisan outposts. The country is in dire need of reform and principled leadership. Is Gen X up to the job?

As you may know, I've written about Generation X numerous times in terms of its place in the world. And, Amanda Fortini recently published an impressive, well-received, and widely circulated New York Times feature on the sandwich generation, suggesting Gen X might just be "the next greatest generation": 

WHEN YOU CONSIDER all the impressive work Generation X has made, it’s funny that one of the most persistent stereotypes about them is that they’re slackers — an idea perpetuated by the films “Slacker” (1990) and “Dazed and Confused” (1993), both written and directed by Richard Linklater (who has directed more than two dozen feature films, including this year’s “Blue Moon” and “Nouvelle Vague”), as well as other movies in the couch potato genre, like “Clerks,” “Singles,” “Swingers,” “Wayne’s World” and “The Big Lebowski.” Somewhere along the way, cynicism and ironic detachment became conflated with laziness. I’d also argue that Gen X was secretly ambitious for fear of the worst accusation of all: selling out. Rosie Perez, 61, whose debut role was in “Do the Right Thing,” sums up Gen X for me like this: “We didn’t really have the economics to get into certain nightclubs or restaurants or whatever. So we created our own vibe. There’s nothing slackerish about that. You know what I’m saying? And it’s, like, still relevant to this day.”

In our current moment, when artistic compromise no longer carries the slightest stigma, Gen X has some wisdom to impart about how to preserve one’s principles, even when times are hard. Because for a while now, the present has looked a lot like the recent past: Everything is commercialized, it’s impossible to find a job, rents are astronomical and reality kind of bites. But you can always make art. In romanticizing the past — a time not so connected, distracted, corporate and slick, not so bought in to easy answers — perhaps we’re longing for a world more hospitable to its creation.

And, as a Gen X writer and reader, I might also point interested parties to a relevant book from Jeff Gordinier, published quite a few years back: 

X Saves the World: How Generation X Got the Shaft but Can Still Keep Everything from Sucking 

In this simultaneously hilarious and incisive "manifesto for a generation that's never had much use for manifestos," Gordinier suggests that for the first time since the "Smells Like Teen Spirit"breakthrough of the early 1990s, Gen X has what it takes to rescue American culture from a state of collapse. Over the past twenty years, the so-called "slackers"have irrevocably changed countless elements of our culture-from the way we watch movies to the way we make sense of a cracked political process to the way the whole world does business.

Artist Residency in a Penthouse Apartment of Denver's RiNo

Artists are finding it increasingly difficult to afford living and studio spaces in an increasingly large number of metro areas. A recent piece in the New York Times spotlighted the decreasing number of artists living and working in the city.

So, how about living for free in gorgeous penthouse apartment in the thriving art scene of the RiNo (River North) neighborhood in Denver? That's the opportunity with the "Residency at FLORA" program, recently spotlighted in Denver's alt-weekly Westword: Artists Can Live in a RiNo Penthouse Through New Residency 

Denver’s River North Art District is packed with art and opportunities for creatives, but with rent for a RiNo apartment averaging $2,095, most artists can’t afford to live there.

But what if they could? Not in a $1,700-a-month, 300-square-foot studio with one window, but a luxury penthouse overlooking the Platte River? That sounds too good to be true, but it’s what one RiNo apartment building is offering through a new artist residency program.

The Residency at FLORA is described as “a living, breathing creative lab where chefs, designers, writers, filmmakers, musicians and artists are invited to produce, experiment and engage.” Sounds very RiNo. Applications are being accepted through January 16; any artist selected will be awarded a furnished penthouse, a dedicated project space, a $500 stipend and collaboration opportunities with other local artists and businesses.

“It is thrilling to see this creative residency take flight at FLORA — it aligns with RiNo Art District’s mission by centering creatives expansively, and is sure to contribute mightily to the vibrancy of the district,” says new RiNo Art District Executive Director Daisy Fodness-McGowan.

Jane Austen -- 250 Years Later

What more can be said about the impact and influence of Jane Austen?

In the world of English literature, the woman from Hampshire, England, who wrote just six novels in her brief and largely uneventful life at the dawn of the nineteenth century, must be considered one of the most significant writers of her time. However, as I noted in a post yesterday about the incredible cottage industry of Austen retellings, adaptations, derivatives, and cultural events, she is also one of the most significant writers of our time as well. 

Her novels have had an outsize influence in the centuries since her death. Not only are the books themselves beloved — as sharply observed portraits of British society, revolutionary narrative projects and deliciously satisfying romances — but the stories she created have so permeated culture that people around the world care deeply about Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy, even if they’ve never actually read “Pride and Prejudice.”

With her 250th birthday this year, the Austen Industrial Complex has kicked into high gear with festivals, parades, museum exhibits, concerts and all manner of merch, ranging from the classily apt to the flamboyantly absurd. The words “Jane mania” have been used; so has “exh-Aust-ion.”

How to capture this brief life, and the blazing impact that has spread across the globe in her wake? Without further ado: a mere sampling of the wealth, wonder and weirdness Austen has brought to our lives. After all, your semi-quincentennial doesn’t come around every day.

I have a few interesting personal connections to Jane. For one, one of my children is named after Austen, and I grew up in Alton, Illinois. What I didn't know until just a few years ago is that the Jane Austen House, which she wrote most of her novels in Alton, England. And, of course, as a long-time high school English teacher, Austen's Pride & Prejudice was a staple in my AP English curriculum. I used to introduce the 19th century novel of manners as one of the original romantic comedies.

Appropriated Novels -- What an Idea

Invention, creation, inspiration -- the fear of the blank page.

The writer -- especially the novelist and to some extent the playwright -- is tasked with the daunting job of creating something from nothing. But what if a writer simply starts with what's already been imagined and written, and then puts a unique spin on the original material? And what if the writer starts with widely known, even famous, literature that is now in the public domain? Well, that might just be the recipe for huge success. For example, I just purchased two fun re-tellings for the high school library where I work:  Pride & Prejudice & Zombies by Seth Graham-Smith and a lesser known but equally entertaining Jane Slayre from Sherri Browning.

The contemporary retelling or "classical adaptation" is a time-honored -- and occasionally quite lucrative -- tradition in literature, film, television, and theater. And the works of Jane Austen have become produced a full cottage industry of derivatives, extensions, and adaptations in the contemporary era. Whether it's the Jane Austen Mystery Series which extend the lives of Elizabeth and Darcy following the end of Pride & Prejudice or the more contemporary retelling of Austen's novel Emma in Amy Heckerling's incredibly successful film Clueless, it seems the work of Austen will literally never go out of style.

Two Bands Saved Punk in the 1980s

Almost from its inception, Punk was declared dead and over. 

The basic idea behind that early mortality and the surprising staying power post-mortem seems to mostly to do with the belief within the early scenes -- New York's Lower East Side and London -- that once punk was on the radar of the mainstream, it was no longer punk. Pivotal music writer Lester Bang felt this way, as did the pioneering punk band Crass which delivered the song "Punk is Dead" in 1978. Mark Perry, founder of the zine Sniffin Glue, argued punk died the minute the Clash signed to a major record deal.

While it all started for me with the Ramones, Clash and Sex Pistols in the early 1980s, past the date punk was declared dead, punk actually gained steam and became the counterculture that exists to this day with the second wave punk bands and scenes sprouting up across the United States and the world. From New York to Washington, DC to Los Angeles to the Bay Area, the spirit of punk -- grounded in the DIY attitude that "I can do that, too ... even better," -- invigorated the culture of punk, and it moved beyond anything the small crew of independent musicians and writers may have imagined in the mid-70s.  

Punk is an interesting phenomenon -- for something seemingly grounded in simplicity, it's actually quite a complex history discussion. And stories of punk history and scenes and culture and artists and the "punk ethos" are endlessly fascinating to me. With that in mind, I truly enjoyed this recent piece in Ultimate Guitar magazine that points to the pivotal role "two bands, two songwriters, and two labels" played in maintaining punk for what it was, is, and will become. Punk Survived Growing Pains in The '80s: But These Two Bands Are (Likely) Responsible for Saving the Genre | Ultimate Guitar

The rise and relatively quick near fall of punk is well documented in the genre's history. While early punk scenes in the UK, NYC, and LA flourished, they just as soon began to flicker, for a variety of reasons. In the UK, early leaders of the movement who had mainstream success, like The Clash and Sex Pistols, eventually fell apart, while across the Atlantic in NYC, a good chunk of the scene embraced the post-punk movement. Things went a little differently in LA, however, as I would argue the punk scene took a bigger hit, or had a higher fall from grace, than it did in either London or New York.

This is well documented, especially if you read my favorite band memoir, "Do What You Want," written by the whole Bad Religion crew. In Southern California, the scene had dried up, so to speak. Bands were shelved, broken up, and the general enthusiasm and energy from the early scene was replaced by rage, agitators, and anarchy. And then, Bad Religion released "Suffer."

"Suffer" was widely seen as the rebirth of SoCal punk and made waves across the national scene here in the US. But I'm not really here to talk about how good the music on that album is. I'm more interested in the infrastructure that would soon be built up by members of Bad Religion, namely guitarist/songwriter Brett Gurewitz. A big part of the Bad Religion story is Epitaph Records, founded by Gurewitz, but closely intertwined with the band's story. And you know what else is highly intertwined with Epitaph Records? Basically, all the punk rock that came after "Suffer."

As the band grew more successful, so too did the record label. Several bands were signed who emerged not only as commercial successes for the indie label, but as huge factors in the rise and continued development of punk in the late '80s, all the way through the 21st century. Bands who were signed included NOFX (more on them later), L7, Less Than Jake, The Offspring, The Vandals, Circle Jerks, Rancid, and Pennywise. Need I say more? The idea of a punk band and punk artist putting out other punk bands wasn't necessarily Gurewitz's original idea, but I'd argue he did it a whole lot better than Greg Ginn did with SST Records.

Jay Kelly is a Beautiful Movie

George Clooney is just sixty-four years old, but he has the old school Hollywood charm that has been the essence of the movie star myth since the days of Jimmy Stewart, Carey Grant, and others. And that "myth" has always been the fundamental romanticization of the lives of the glitterati. Clooney's most recent film - Jay Kelly, streaming now on Netflix - is a deceptively simple yet touchingly poignant look into that world.

The movie will, no doubt, garner numerous accolades and award nominations for Clooney, whose title character is an aging movie star just like himself facing the end of a career and a self-accounting for what sacrifices got him to where he is, and for Adam Sandler in a thoughtful and vulnerable role of the "manager" to a Hollywood star. Writer and director Noah Baumbach will almost certainly collect nominations and award for Best Original Screenplay.

The Unlikely Super Bowl Matchup You Want to See

I just want it noted for the record that on September 23, 2023, when Deion Sander's -- or "Coach Prime's" new CU Buffs football team was rolling to a great start, and then Bo Nix and the Oregon Duck's came to town and absolutely pasted the Colorado team 42-6 with Nix on the Duck's first drive drilling a 40+-yard touchdown pass to the corner of the end zone, I said, "The Denver Broncos should draft Bo Nix next year. I want Bo!"

And now, in one of the wonkiest years in recent NFL history, the Denver Broncos with their sophomore year QB are sitting atop the AFC West Conference with a tie-breaker lead over the New England Patriots for the number one seed while the dynastic Kansas City Chiefs are idling in third place with a sub-500 record at 6-7. And my bold prediction is the Broncos are going to the Super Bowl. And the ideal NFC opponent is another team dear to my heart, a team that has been waiting quite a while to get back on top -- The Chicago Bears.

I know, I know. Two teams with second-year quarterbacks and winning records but a a lot of close games, along with several holes in their offense and defense, amidst a league with a lot of teams like the Patriots and the Packers and the Lions and the Chargers ready to step up and take the crown. But a Denver-Chicago Super Bowl would be a heckuva game. 

Everyone is Using AI to "Create"

A recent op-ed in the Wall Street Journal suggests "When anyone can produce passable work, real talent becomes more readily apparent than ever." Thus, AI, rather than destroying or replacing human creativity, is actually a gift to the real creative people and innovators in society.

As Oscar contenders like “The Brutalist” deploy artificial intelligence to perfect foreign accents and AI-generated country tracks top the charts, anxiety is roiling the creative community. Fear mongers warn that AI will hollow out artistic expression, de-skill entire professions, and damage our capacity for original thought. It won’t. AI is ultimately a boon for creativity.

True, AI can finish work by itself without an artist, but that affects the volume of output more than the nature of human creativity. AI relieves humans not of creativity but of drudgery—the rote, time-consuming tasks that have always consumed more human energy than inspiration ever did. Artists have never defined themselves by their use of certain tools, but by what they do with them.

2025 was truly the year of AI, almost reminiscent of the date August 4, 1997 in The Terminator when Skynet, the artificial intelligence system that ultimately takes over the world, officially went online, kicking off the rapid march to machines' dominance over man. And, honestly, no one knows better the seeming instantaneous omnipresence of "everyone using AI" than teachers at nearly all levels, from elementary school to graduate programs. A quick scan of social media -- or "Teacher Twitter" -- will reveal all manner of requests, rants, and ramblings about how to address the use of AI. For writing teachers especially, it seems like a return to handwritten in-class assignments is one key response.

And, in terms of creativity, I would tend to agree with the Wall Street Journal article that when everyone is using AI to create, the landscape will take on such an obvious tech-induced/influenced style that the truly innovative and creative people will be able to stand out. As I noted in a piece on AI yesterday, I maintain that while humans were able to conceive of, envision, and create artificial intelligence, AI would never have been able to conceive of humans.