It’s the last Wednesday of summer—if summer is the period between Memorial Day and Labor Day—and the Curator wants to know, “Where did it go?” Hard to believe the kids are back in school, and that summer can only justify one more “I’m slipping out at 4 on Friday.”

Speaking of school, here’s a piece from NPR.com, A Picture of Language:  The Fading Art of Diagramming Sentences, by Juana Summers. TBT, I can’t diagram a sentence to save my life. Honors English all through junior high and high school, and I never learned the skill. I also have no easy time with identifying various parts of a sentence, and many “sentences” in my first year of college included not much more than words (the first of which started with an uppercase first letter) and some form of punctuation at the end.

By now you’ve maybe heard about Texas Governor Rick Perry and the indictment. I was pretty sure the first sitting governor to be indicted in 2014 would be Chris Christie from New Jersey. Alas, while there might still be an NJ indictment—state, federal, or both—Rick Perry won the race for first sitting governor, either party, to be indicted in 2014. (Former Virginia Governor Bob “blame it on the missus” McDonnell—and his wife—are on trial as I write this post, but he was out of office several days before his indictment issued.)

Anyway, the Perry indictment has gotten lots of attention. I offer Conventional Wisdom on Perry Indictment Misses a Few Key Points by Wayne Slater for the Dallas Morning News on August 20. Lest the regulars think I’m “in the tank” on this one, the case feels thin to me, but criminal law is not my field, and Wayne Slater is a big-deal reporter in Texas.

Is Milwaukee the New Portland? Milwaukee is the New Portland, written for Salon by Richard Manning, says “yes.” Read it and decide for yourself.

With the end of summer, people get more focused on work, which does include, yes, the cocktail party. From Molly Watson for SeriousEats.com, you’re getting a must-read article, Manner Matters:  How to Make a Graceful Exit. (I’m now a marked man, I’m sure, although I’m rarely in a hurry to leave any party.)

Food & Wine puts forward some very nice “best of” Internet posts. Here’s Best Pizza Places in the U.S., featuring 28 pizzerias. I’ve been to three, Bar Toma in Chicago, Pizzeria Mozza in Los Angeles, and Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix, and have had pizza, in New York, made by Co. founder/owner Jim Lahey, Mr. No-Knead. I do need to get out more, and this list looks aspirational to say the least.