From Way Downtown, i.e. Jamaica Plain via Ithaca, N.Y.

Stop the virtual presses for a "Secret Knowledge of Backroads" first: A guest author! My friend Allison, who's been referenced in these pages a handful of times before, was so excited by her alma mater Cornell's success in the NCAA tournament this month that she had to write something here. (I jokingly invited her to pen something. In her euphoria, she immediately said yes.) And now, drum rolls and Allison:

"HEY SPORTSFANS.

"My name is Allison, Cornell University class of 2005, and Aaron has offered me the honor of a guest spot on his blog today. Actually, he might have been kidding, but too bad! You might remember me from my other appearances on this blog, like the time he invited me to contribute a few words about Beach House; if you learned what Snell's Window was that day, well, you're welcome! Another time, he called me out for skipping all his sports posts and only reading the ones about indie rock. Funnily enough, though, I'm here today to talk about none other than BASKETBALL.

"Here's the thing: Cornell's basketball team is really good this year and most of us totally don't know what to do about it. We're beside ourselves with a weird new excitement. We're frantically studying up on teams we haven't paid attention to all season. We're calling our dads and actually having something to talk to them about. We're wearing Cornell shirts and yelling in sports bars (and then turning to each other and whispering things like, 'Wait, what's the deal with the shot clock again?')

"It's not like I never paid attention to NCAA hoops. I grew up in Connecticut (former home of the Whale [editor's note: as proof of Allison's unfamiliarity with sports, the team was actually the Hartford Whalers], current home of nothing besides UConn basketball), so March Madness was always a serious deal. My family's sort-of-friendly bracket contest was usually dominated by the team of my dad, who knew a lot about basketball, and my little sister, who liked 'Gonzaga' because it reminded her of the Muppets. No matter what, it was always UConn for the win.

"But the bracket is a strange place this year. On Sunday, Cornell advanced to the Sweet 16, foundering fourth-seeded Wisconsin under so many points that the second half of the game wasn't even interesting enough to televise. Meanwhile, UConn, after a season that doesn't bear talking about, quietly rolled over and died in some sad post-season invitational game. (I'm talking about the UConn men, of course--the women are super boring these days, having just set a record for winning the most games in a row of any team in any sport in the history of time.)

"While I was at Cornell I attended maybe five sporting events. One of them, in 2001, was a men's basketball game versus Princeton, at Princeton. I sat in the home section, wore a red shirt, yelled "go Big Red!" once in my girly little voice and got personally chanted at to 'SIT DOWN, YOU SUCK! SIT DOWN, YOU SUCK!' by almost everyone in the arena. So I did, because we sucked.

"I didn't think we had that much to be ashamed of, though. Princeton was the Ivy League champion that year. Some years they'd even show up in first round of the bracket like a novelty act and generate a little chatter about their 'intellectual' style of play. When Cornell made it into the first round of the tournament last year it was similarly adorable. I admit I'd almost forgotten it had even happened.

"Nobody's talking about Cornell's intellectual style right now. This isn't some ragged gang of engineering geeks throwing the competition for a loop with secret Rube Goldberg plays based on complex trigonometry. They're just plain good, and they don't look one bit surprised about it. They like to start out bold on offense early in the game, and then never let up; Temple and Wisconsin never recovered. Their passing: psychic. Their three-pointers: swoosh.

"Cornell plays number-one seeded Kentucky tonight at Syracuse, which is the next best thing to a home game. They could win, you guys. I know, right? This is totally weird."

So, Um, Is Providence, R.I., Cool?

Answering that question is my academic charge, more or less, for the next six weeks. Creating arts districts and cool downtowns, populated by hipsters, yuppies and yipsters, is approached almost systematically these days by planners and politicians, as though there were specific conditions that make them, if not a formula. Of course, there's nothing systematic about it. Cool comes and it goes. Once most people think something is cool, it probably isn't any longer. Or not.

Providence, R.I., certainly puts this to the test. Even on a rainy afternoon yesterday, its downtown was lovely, with great 19th-century and prewar architecture, attractive narrow streets, nice State House grounds and a mall that actually knits itself into the urban street grid and surroundings. (After that, though, the mall's charm is obviously debatable.) RISD produces hundreds of artists, architects and designers every year and has a new museum designed by Rafael Moneo. The noise scene has produced Les Savy Fav, Lightning Bolt and others. Oh, and there's Brown University, a few other quality colleges, and several big employers.

On the other hand, there's the unemployment rate -- 13.4 percent now and almost always higher than those of the country and Massachusetts. Then there's the high poverty rate, the flat population of about 170,000 people and a general sense, as one city planner told us, of a mismatch between unskilled labor and the 21st-century economy. Oh, and the city is trying to institutionalize the cool thing, re-nicknaming Providence "The Creative Capital." Naturally, the planning department is following the mayor's lead and trying to capture those people too.

In the 21st century, shouldn't Providence be able to distinguish itself from Boston, New York, Philadelphia and D.C.? So why does it sometimes seem to be part of metro Boston? Do great buildings and cheaper rent win out, or does being closer to where other cool people and scenes already are? Are 170,000 people, many of whom aren't cool, enough to create traction or does your scene become too small of an island? When so many of the students from your two premier universities come from out of state, they're probably going to leave the state when they graduate. But do so many have to go? Why would a twenty-something stay? Should a city base its relaunch on twenty-somethings? The 21st century is hard.

I'm most curious to see which states are the ones that import college graduates. What are they doing and do they really deserve the gigantic gift?

Update: This is post number 200. Cool.

David Frum Is The New David Brooks

David Brooks is often tagged with a back-handed compliment: He is the only conservative pundit liberals can admit to liking. Sometimes Brooks' columns head for strange tangents, but I'll gladly be more direct in my admiration. He firmly believes in moderation, rationality, intellect, compromise and personal values, without being huffy, offensively judgmental or dismissive of those who disagree. When so much of the right is dictatorial and obsessed with purity and exclusion these days -- ironic considering it's the party of the free market -- Brooks is a refreshing alternative.

Add David Frum to the list. Now, Frum, as a former speechwriter for Bush 43 who's credited with coining "Axis of Evil," former WSJ editorial page editor and champion of conservative causes, has a lot working against him. But on his Web site, which is "dedicated to the modernization and renewal of the Republican Party and the conservative movement," Frum is similar to Brooks. He doesn't find as much to like about Democratic causes as Brooks, but Frum takes apart the current, dangerously reactionary version of the Republican Party with reasoned, intelligent analysis.

In criticizing a conservative platform signed last month, he notes the manifesto's silence on middle-class wages, health insurance, the military, the environment, education and illegal immigration, among other, oh, monumentally important domestic and foreign policies. He writes the platform -- and perhaps the whole party, though I may be projecting -- "exists in airless isolation from the actual concerns, troubles and challenges facing the people of the country conservatives seek to lead." He concludes: "The document answers one question and one question only. If you agree that Barack Obama is engaged in a deliberate and relentless attack on the American constitutional order, well be assured: the conservative establishment is on your side. But if you think those worries are a hysterical distraction from the country's actual problems? To you, the conservative world says: go away."

In short, Frum gets it. As the official and unofficial sides of the Republican Party have flown into a stratosphere of name-calling, overblown rhetoric and bloodlust without having any carefully considered basis or ideas, Frum asks everyone to return to earth to think. Even if one disagrees with what he thinks, it's still hard to object to his approach. That Frum blogs in the influential but obscure corners of the Internet and Tea Parties mount a furious charge against the national political system reveals something sad about our current state of affairs.

Update: The conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute has fired David Frum.

"March Mediocrity" Also Has An Alliterative Ring

As the NCAA college basketball tournament starts, much has been written about the NCAA possibly expanding from 64 to 96 teams. Some of the objections highlight what's supposedly a weaker field this year (though yesterday's very entertaining games suggest otherwise), but basing long-term policy on short-term conditions is foolish. The reactions of Times' sports columnists helps reveal who they are: George Vecsey, that lover of folly, wit, great irony and great games, calls it as it is, saying the expansion would be done purely for the NCAA to make more money on its TV contract, while "the math just does not work with a possible glut of 96 teams" -- to say nothing of "the poetry, the panache, the pizazz" that would evaporate. William Rhoden, who writes most vociferously for including social justice in sports, counters by arguing an expanded tournament would give more unsung teams a chance to shine.

Rhoden's interpretation is naive. With more slots, who is the NCAA going to invite: The equivalent of the University of Northern Iowa, St. Mary's or Morgan State (his alma mater), aka the little-known upstarts whose only moment in the sun comes in the tournament's first weekend? Or Clemson, Arizona State, and their ilk, aka major universities with major but mediocre sports programs that have tens of thousands of fans who will travel to first-round games? Of course, the answer is the latter. Unfortunately, money trumps charm, more often than not.

What's beautiful about the tournament is the element of risk: Maybe the No. 15 seed Robert Morris will improbably upset No. 2 seed Villanova, as almost happened last night. Maybe UNI's guard will hit a 28-foot jumper with less than a second in the game to defeat UNLV, as what happened last night. The first two days of the tournament, when there are games galore happening all of the time, are unrivaled -- each possession weighted with such importance; a rollicking up-and-down game whose energy more than compensates for its sloppy nerve; love and passion. With 96 teams, there will be lots with records barely above .500 but large, wealthy fan bases and power conferences' institutional powers playing pedestrian games, usurping the chance for an underdog to create something wonderful, sweaty and inimitable.

More importantly when it comes to college sports, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan suggested recently that teams that don't graduate at least 40 percent of their players shouldn't be allowed to play in "March Madness." Actually: Why not make it 100 percent, minus those who leave for the NBA early and are drafted? If a university can't provide its students, including its athletes, with a collegiate education, it's not fulfilling its core mission. Why then should it get to enjoy the lucrative but peripheral benefits of sports?

My fiancee's stepfather and I were talking earlier today about this. He suggested all players should have to go to college for four years before graduating. I initially disagreed, saying that blocking NBA-caliber players from entering the NBA early is unfair. They're stopped from earning millions of dollars during their prime, in a career whose earning years are hyper-compressed and whose dollars are rarely guaranteed. But now that I think about it, as much fun as college basketball is, why not truly commit to the idea that universities exist to educate? This way, when even the successful NBA players retire at 35 years old, they have other marketable skills and continue to earn money through their adult lives, to say nothing of the players who stop playing ball when they're 22 and don't have anything else to fall back on.

Of All The World's Natural-Resource Shortages...

...The Wall Street Journal chose to focus on band names. The Journal has long been deservedly famous for the quirky story it puts on A1 each day -- aka the "A-hed" -- which has sadly become more infrequent since Rupert Murdoch's ownership began. But this one from last month was forced in its attempt at cheekiness, if not blatantly unnecessary.

Sure, there are 1,900 bands playing this week at the South by Southwest conference in Austin and more than 6,500 names added each month to AllMusic.com's database. That doesn't mean it's unbelievably challenging to come up with a good band name. In fact, if you and your band aren't creative enough to come up with one that fits your style and sounds cool, you probably shouldn't be a band.

The Journal has also long been deservedly famous for strictly separating its stridently conservative editorial board from its insightful, even-keeled reporting -- though, again, that has also declined under Murdoch's ownership. As innocent a story as this one was meant to be, perhaps its news desk should be devoting more time to water, timber, coal, oil, climate change, etc, rather than how scarce good band names are supposedly becoming.

Why Not Some More On Pavement?

As an impulse in the midst of a hectic two weeks, I bought today two tickets to Pavement's Sept. 18 show in town. While there was never any doubt that I wanted to go, I don't think I've spent $100 on concert tickets six months in advance of a show since high school, when I saw the Dave Matthews Band perform at Giants Stadium.

Pavement has long been one of the few bands I've lusted to see live but never have; for them, the main reason I missed out was they disbanded before I started to like them intensely and go to shows at clubs, not Giants Stadium. So what if it's a reunion tour accompanied by a mildly shameless best-of compilation that received a 10.0 rating from Pitchfork? And so what if there's a decent chance almost all the shows' set lists will resemble the one from the first night, earlier this month in Auckland, New Zealand? Pavement represents that era when you didn't have to be cool to be awesome; when loving words, slovenly wit and music were enough to be great and loved. Their creations seem effortless -- and maybe they are. They never reveal enough for you to know truly what happens, but enough so you can join the fun.

I haven't had an assigned seat in about eight years, but I think this will be worth it. Here's a funny video explaining how Pavement was pelted with mud at a show in West Virginia at the 1995 Lollapalooza tour:

Why "The Boy With The Arab Strap" Might Be Better Than "If You're Feeling Sinister"

Whether you prefer "If You're Feeling Sinister" or "The Boy With The Arab Strap," the two records Belle and Sebastian made at the height of its powers, is revealing about who you are. Do you prefer consistency, which is on remarkable display in the first, particularly from the lovely acoustic guitar strums of "Get Me Away From Here, I'm Dying" on through the record's second half? Or do you prefer that your high marks be higher, even if the lower points are lower, which happens on the second, with the witty, melancholic send-up of the biz in "Seymour Stein" and the devilishly delicate romp in "Dirty Dream Number Two"? Clearly, the implications are more profound than a simple musical choice.

Obviously, these two records are only one example of the dilemma, but they're a touchstone reference for me and my fiancee. These days I think I take "The Boy With The Arab Strap" -- but for a different reason: Its second and last songs are substantially better than their predecessor's counterparts. Those two songs are the most important on every record; they separate the great records from the good ones. The second track proves the band didn't waste all of its hits with the opening number -- a tacky strategy -- and that it has enough in reserve to sustain a whole record. The last track summarizes an album the way any good concluding statement should. On "The Boy With The Arab Strap," "Sleep the Clock Around" and "The Rollercoaster Ride" hit both notes perfectly.

In fact, "Sleep the Clock Around" has been one of my favorite songs for a decade now. I used one of its lyrics, "There's a lot to be done while you're head is still young," in my high school yearbook and still use it on my Facebook profile. It motivates me like little else. Anyway, to try to tip your scale the way mine does, here's Belle and Sebastian performing that song:

Gov. Paterson Knew What He Was Doing

At my fiancee's organization, she says the staff often talk about preventing the low-income students they tutor from sabotaging their potential success when they're on the brink of a breakthrough. Too often students shy away from triumph, as they subconsciously do something to thwart themselves, she says. Maybe Gov. David Paterson of New York should give her office a call, as the circumstances of his withdrawal from this year's gubernatorial race seem to be subconsciously intentional. He'd never say it aloud, but in the back of his mind, he doesn't object that he has to step aside.

Paterson, a Democrat, suspended his campaign last Friday, only one week after starting it, because he called the woman who filed a restraining order for domestic abuse against one of his top aides, who was her boyfriend, the day before she was due in court for the case. Turns out she never showed, the case was dismissed and Paterson now rightfully looks like someone who used his political power to intervene in the justice system. (It certainly doesn't help that his state police unit seemed to be even more heavy-handed about it.) This isn't the sort of thing you do when you're a governor, especially when you're criticizing a state senator -- the indefatigably obnoxious Hiram Monserrate -- for having his staff influence the girlfriend who Monserrate abused.

Or maybe it is the sort of thing you do when you're Paterson. All incumbent politicians' poll number are low these days, but his were particularly abysmal, rarely passing a 20 percent approval rating. Few politicians wanted to support him for re-election. Everyone else hoped New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo would challenge him in the Democratic primary. Lots spoke poorly of Paterson's gubernatorial skills and/or interest. Legislators didn't seem to respect him. Any fiscal or ethical reforms he tried to make were derided. Perhaps he just wanted out, plain and simple. Intervening in a domestic abuse case -- and hiding it -- isn't exactly the easy way to go about it, and now Cuomo's office has opened an investigation. Any reasonable, intelligent person would realize this, and Paterson should qualify as such. But when you're mentally and physically exhausted, if not broken, maybe there are some tiny axons firing in the back of your mind, pushing you ahead, against all rationale. Everyone else wanted him out. How quickly and suddenly that actually happened just seems a little too convenient not to think that Gov. Paterson didn't want out too.

Finally, it's worth noting that the Times is now responsible for ending the political careers of two consecutive New York governors. (Spitzer was before Paterson, and remarkably, both downfalls happened in the lifetime of this blog; that's proof it's become a veteran.) As a friend noted, Paterson was essentially Humpty-Dumpty -- things were already quite close to collapsing -- but the Times' Albany bureau gave that final, deserved push.