Tuesday, May 12. 2009
The writing of 1984, in The Guardian. (h/t, Althouse's We shall abolish the orgasm.)The piece begins:
 "It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen."
Sixty years after the publication of Orwell's masterpiece, Nineteen Eighty-Four, that crystal first line sounds as natural and compelling as ever. But when you see the original manuscript, you find something else: not so much the ringing clarity, more the obsessive rewriting, in different inks, that betrays the extraordinary turmoil behind its composition.
Probably the definitive novel of the 20th century, a story that remains eternally fresh and contemporary, and whose terms such as "Big Brother", "doublethink" and "newspeak" have become part of everyday currency, Nineteen Eighty-Four has been translated into more than 65 languages and sold millions of copies worldwide, giving George Orwell a unique place in world literature.
 Health-conscious Brits ban library steps. Not satire. What's the point of being healthy if you can't read the book?
Now it's 1.85 trillion
Awaiting the California Rebellion
Bring back ROTC
Something awful is being done to you. Tiger
Letter of Amends from a Recovering Liberal
Chris Dodd's sinking ship. It's about time.
The quietly rusting Dem advantage. h/t, Insty
Obama laughs at notion of Limbaugh's death. Why? Isn't debate healthy for America?
Is it a good idea to go directly to college after high school? Probably not, unless you are a dedicated scholar.
I doubt that it is guaranteed that Obamacare will pass, but nobody tells us the details. Here are some thoughts: How Obamacare will affect your doctor. Tiger wonders whether there will be liability caps. Our Dr. Bliss offered a few modest proposals a couple of weeks ago. Also, a look at Canada's system.
Photo of confused college grad via Right Wing Prof
h/t, Ace:
Monday, May 11. 2009
The GOP's woman problem. A friend of mine says it's because women expect their husbands to dump them for younger gals, and hope the gummint will fill in.
So sorry that I made a little joke.
Sambo brand? Bigotry of the Left
Father Cutie's story. What do you expect with a name like that?
Bad depression. Give me ECT, anytime, if it will help with the Obama Blues.
Semi-related: Politicians as shrinks. Gimme a break.
Pope walks out. Good Pope.
Kami is back.
Woops. Ocean warming (?) doesn't fit the computer models. But does it fit "the narrative"?
Carbon-free sugar? What's the point? All food is full of carbon, and so are we. We are what is termed a carbon-based life form. Carbon is a good foundation for tons of cool molecules, hence Organic Chemistry. It means carbon-based chemistry.
Semi-related: A boycott of US Treasury vehicles. I would not drive one.
A push-back at the O's college speeches
Big-time debt. What for? Oh, I almost forgot. It's not their money.
One of us quoted Dylan recently, who said something like "You got to take your inspiration wherever you can get it."
And we recently posted the lines which begin "Sing, Goddess...." Thus acknowledging that the Goddess is the author, not the man. The man is the messenger.
It reminds me of what my pastor once said to me when I asked where the preaching came from: "I stand up there, and the Holy Spirit uses me. It just flows out. I have nothing to do with it."
The definition of "inspiration" is "the immediate effect of God or gods." How wonderful is it that the word doubles as the medical term for inhaling, and that "expiration" doubles for exhaling and for death?
Whitestone Bridge to LaGuardia, Manhattan in the distance:
Nice early morning Tennessee thunderstorm with cheerful tornadoes buzzing around:
Nashville skyline, 6 AM:
Biscuits and sausage gravy: one of the reasons to fly south for brekkie. Nectar of the Gods:
Wish we had this kind of delivery up here:
More Tennessee breakfast:
This is a smoking establishment. Smoke and drink and enjoy life and raise hell with live music in freedom from the nannies:
The Dylanologist has commented here that Nashville lost any hope of being a charming city when it bought into the urban renewal craze in the 60s and erased its history, replacing it with parking garages, car dealerships, strip malls, and other forms of true urban blight. When civil rights leaders in the 70s referred to urban renewal as "urban removal," they were correct: it eliminated residential neighborhoods from the downtowns (see Bridgeport, CT too and, by stark contrast, Savannah, GA and Manhattan - where gentrified old "slums" are some of the most desirable places to live in, eg Chelsea, aka Hell's Kitchen), leaving those renewed downtowns as dangerous ghost towns at night and forcing people into the suburbs and into their cars. (The replacement of streetcars with busses is a whole, interesting story in itself. Maybe the Dyl will take it on if he has some time.)
I think it's fun to find some of the few remaining reminders of how pleasant Nashville once was before genius government planners with their theories, bulldozers and wrecking balls got to work:
A close-up:
Isn't a popular definition of insanity that of repeating the same behavior while expecting a different result?
Boston plans a "little dig." Good grief.
Our brains are a cemetery of words. There is no way except with inner vision to explain how you feel. Thoughtless. Be careful or you will think with words. That's why I can do ballet. I can't write, I can't even spell. I am made in silence. As soon as I start speaking, I stop seeing.
George Balanchine
 When statism fails, blame the private sector
The real history of Mother's Day (thanks, reader)
Dolphin Stadium becomes Landshark Stadium. It is impossible not to enjoy Jimmy Buffett.
Repub mean-spiritedness alert
The Producers comes to Berlin. Gotta love it.
Rich Obama supporters realize he is a class warrior
Slobbering over Michelle O. Get a room.
Kudlow discusses gangster government with Tom Lauria
Quoted at Driscoll:
All The President’s Men solidified this idea of journalism that “makes a difference” in the heads of a generation of journalists. It not only encouraged a lot of what is called “Pulitzer bait” — the five-part series — but it generally attracted to the business a lot of liberal do-gooders who thought of themselves as superior to their readers.
Last year, there was a certain news story that caused Ace of Spades to erupt in fury: “Stop telling me what to think!” (I wish I could find that post, because it was good.) Nobody wants to do the straight-ahead Joe Friday “just-the-facts-ma’am” news story, because there is no prestige in that kind of basic reporting.
From a piece at Hot Air (h/t, Conservatism Today):
Republican politicians often forget that conservatism is an argument, while liberalism is a promise. The conservative champions both the moral and practical superiority of liberty and individualism. The liberal promises tangible rewards in exchange for votes. The conservative argument will never be over, because any free-market system will always include a certain population who fare poorly. No matter how small that population is, or how much the overall wealth of society eases the burden of their poverty, they will always be extremely receptive to the seduction of collective politics: You’re not responsible for your lot in life. You were cheated. The wealth of others is unfair. Give us the “freedom” that wasn’t doing you any good anyway, and we will sharpen it into a weapon against those who took advantage of you. Give us your undying support, and you’ll never have to worry about feeling confused, guilty, or inadequate again. Voting for the Democrat ticket will fully discharge your moral and intellectual duty as a citizen - we’ll take it from there. In fact, we’ve got ACORN representatives standing by to fill that ballot out for you. You have a “right” to housing, a job, health care, a college education, easy credit, and a host of other benefits, and the liberal promises to provide all of these things, while making nameless rich people pick up the tab.
Sunday, May 10. 2009
Recently stumbled upon Furious Seasons. It's a shrinkology-related but far from shrinks-only site. Provocative.
The guy is a patient and a journalist, not a shrink.
I know that Mother's Day was invented by Hallmark to sell greeting cards but, now that it exists, the child or husband who neglects it is in deep trouble. My wife (and my own Mom too, self excepted - believe myself to be the Black Sheep) produced some fairly OK kiddies.
Here's the new garden path you always wanted, wifey. Looped around my prize peach tree. Perhaps I did lead you down the garden path, but if you don't want my peaches, baby, don't shake my tree.
Yes, left front is a Harry Lauder's Walking Stick. Cool plant. A dwarfed, sterile, and contorted Hazel or Filbert, which looks most interesting in winter when you can see its strange shape.
Reposted -
The Jonathan Fairbanks house in Dedham, MA. 1636. Those are the bones of the basic center-hall Colonial. The slope of that roof is great for either snow or rain.
Multiculturally-sensitive though he may be, Sippican Cottage is omitting pueblos and phony old houses in St. Augustine from his thorough research on the topic. He means real wood-framed houses.
It's easy to detect the core of the farmhouse, before all of the additions and extensions.
What a young nation we are.
1 John 4:7-21
7Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
13We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. 14And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. 16And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. 17In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him. 18There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
19We love because he first loved us. 20If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. 21And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.
Saturday, May 9. 2009
From a Vandy graduation yesterday. I saw no signs directing folks towards tofu and organic water -
The Law School:
Tent, Lily Turf, and daisies -
If you have never been there, it's a nice leafy, parklike 300-acre campus in the city, but unfortunately it lacks a large open central gathering place: no landscape core like a town green, or like the Sheep Meadow in Central Park. Olmstead would have designed a serenely dramatic psychological center to it all.
and it has tons of gigantic Magnolias:
and plenty of other good scenery, as the South always has (view from the front was even better. She had that pouty but cool look that said "I doubt you are worthy of talking to me, but I know you want to and I know what you're thinking. F- off."):
The newly-minted and doubtless rapacious young lawyers:
No skimping. Mountains of strawberries with accompanying mountains of confectioner's sugar - and too much champagne to keep up with the rate of serving. You just had to man up and do your best. As I said to the servers, "Can't let it go to waste. Think of all the thirsty people in Arabia."
Thanks to the good old New Yorker Commodore Vanderbilt, a very interesting fellow, for all he did to improve the world with the riches he just could not help but to accumulate due to his energy and his entrepreneurial and savvy spirit back in the days before income taxes:
As we enter graduation season, it's time to re-post P.J. O'Rourke's 2008 Commencement speech. His first piece of advice:
1. Go out and make a bunch of money!
Here we are living in the world's most prosperous country, surrounded by all the comforts, conveniences and security that money can provide. Yet no American political, intellectual or cultural leader ever says to young people, "Go out and make a bunch of money." Instead, they tell you that money can't buy happiness. Maybe, but money can rent it.
There's nothing the matter with honest moneymaking. Wealth is not a pizza, where if I have too many slices you have to eat the Domino's box. In a free society, with the rule of law and property rights, no one loses when someone else gets rich.
Read the whole thing.
 Thinking about smells and tastes today (they are essentially the same thing). My big old barn/garage did it to me this morning, with the warm air filled with scent and memories.
For me, that warm stew of the scents of gasoline, oil, grease, hay in the hay-loft, grain, tools and machines, dust, tractors, sawdust, kerosene, piles of saved lumber, old paint cans, leather tack and the saddle soap for it, the sweetness of fresh horse manure - mixed with the smell of the new grass and clover and wildflowers springing up in the fields wafting around - is an emotional thread that runs all the way back to my earliest childhood in Connecticut.
What it reminded me of today was being a lad of 8 or 10 helping my Dad build a new mounting block for my Mom and for us kids to get up on the horses. My Mom had a couple of big hunters, and appreciated a help to get up on them. She was almost always either pregnant or getting over being pregnant, but she loved the Hunt. These mounting block things had steps and a platform, with a railing on one side. My Dad would only use a hand-saw, believing that bench saws and the like were for the pros. He had one, but never used it. He could cut a straight line.
I was instructed to paint it barn red to match the horse barn, and the railings and cross-pieces white.
They make them out of plastic nowadays, but this guy built a simple wooden one.
Photo is one of those nasty modern plastic mounting blocks. Looks like made by Fisher-Price. Advantage: you can move them around easily.
 Fire and Ice
Some say the world will end in fire;
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To know that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
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h/t, Chequerboard
Comment from the B: Nice pic. Anybody who has never had Canada Goose breast, sauteed rare and sliced thin on the bias with a wild mushroom, port wine and huckleberry sauce cannot truly appreciate these wonderful big birds.
And maybe a nice parsnip puree on the side.
Friday, May 8. 2009
Another reminiscence from our shrink friend Nathan about his days in the Indian Health Service -
 A limp and a death among the Lakota Sioux marked my first day at Eagle Butte, devoid of eagles and buttes. Two days’ drive from Chicago, I am greeted from afar by John Running Horse, he dipping and rising like a Venetian gondolier, waving aloft what from afar seemed to be the plaster sculpture of a leg. Up close, it is.
Before I could stop completely, John Running Horse lay one hand on the open window of my red Fiat 128, bowed in head and cast, asked, “You the new doc?” I was. “Put this thing on again”; hands me the cast, then points to his gondoliering leg. I park and head in.
The Indian Health Service had told me that there were two docs; arrive Sunday.
But, by Sunday, Dr. K. had been flown out with her atrial flutter to be cardioverted eighty miles up the road to Mobridge; Dr. L. was riding shotgun with a mother in active labor also to Mobridge. No docs in Eagle Butte.
I wrapped a new cast on John Running Horse’s right leg and asked as I did so -- dipping plaster rolls in warm water, smoothing them first around, then smoothing downward along the fracture to make it seamless -- how his old cast got cut off. Itched, he said; cut it off himself, as he unsheathe his James Black/Musso pattern S-guard bowie knife. White plaster still dusted its curved Stainless steel back tip and brass quillion; hadn’t even wiped it clean.
I told John Running Horse that his skin would itch again after a few days; dried skin flakes. I found a metal coat hanger, bent it straight and showed him how he could insert it within the cast to scratch itches. He found this marvelous; made a special leather sheath for it to hang from his belt. Later, he returned; brought a water color gift; painted himself on his horse; he wearing Sioux gear. In his right hand, born aloft like some victorious banner is not a leg cast, but his Winchester Model 1894 lever-repeating rifle -- the gun that won the West, the weapon of choice for the Rifleman of TV.
Continue reading "A Limp and a Death"
You used to just plain peter out at 68 or 79 or 93 but, after 1951, the law changed and some Doc had to make up a cause to put on the death certificate. A proximate cause, plus additional lines to fill in for contributing causes/underlying causes of death. (Imagine what that change did to disease stats!) More many more little-known facts about death.
Old time Docs knew that people died when they got old and rickety or had a bum ticker or some nasty growths. You plumb wear out eventually, and it is just a matter of which internal doohickey crapped out first. It was considered sort-of natural, and not a medical issue.
And, when folks died, they either said "They died" or "They ascended to their Maker" or "Went to their eternal reward." They did not say "They passed" (what a strange expression - passed what? New Agey-sounding, isn't it? Took a pass on more life, or what? Passed into the Spirit World?) or "passed away," as the relentlessly euphemistic funeral home people used to say. Like they aren't dead: they just sort of floated away past the 7-11 and the Pontiac dealership and the Pizza Hut to somewhere else.
Maybe to the lovely Mall in the Sky.
The only reward of virtue is virtue.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (h/t, Vanderleun)
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