Now, I’m no Lou Reed, but I had this same thing happen to me when I emceed the Bay Area’s Best a few weeks ago. Of course, Lou was presumably getting big bucks for his gig. I just did mine for the love. And no one empowered me to turn things up. Next time.

Detailed list of cultural norms. Many if not all (a post-modern debate for another time) of these have no intrinsic meaning. “Thumbs up” – offensive? Encouraging? Flirty? It’s entirely culturally constructed. If you step back and think about that, it’s pretty fascinating.