One of Bill Cosby's early standup routines was called A Nut in Every Car. Cosby painted an amusing picture of subway passengers being uproariously entertained as they were assaulted by zealots, drunks and young toughs. My mother told of riding the subway with an extravert friend. Some fellow tried to cop a feel, so her friend grabbed his arm, held it up and shouted, "Anyone here lose a hand?" We lived in the suburbs, and along with the movies, these formed my impressions of riding the subway.

You've probably heard that Hawaiian James J Lee apparently hated Discovery Channel's programming so much that he took hostages at their offices in Silver Spring MD.

I don't know what to make of Japan - a former regional empire, rebuilt as an economic dynamo or an aging country that is rapidly being overtaken by their former whipping boy, China. They rapidly embrace and adapt to Western culture but also seek to maintain their racial purity. They raped Nanking, kept comfort women in Korea, and bombed Pearl Harbor, but after being defeated in WWII and losing two cities to the atomic bomb, purport to have rejected armed conflict.