Wednesday, July 28. 2010
Here. It was Edwardian: high-fashion with post-Victorian mores and plenty of mineral water. Edward Vll himself loved to hang out there and pick up chicks. Back then, being a bit pudgy was not a problem. We remain in his debt for making tweed respectable, and for replacing white tie and tails with the simple black tie of today.
Monday, July 26. 2010
From a review of Fischer's Made in America: A Social History of American Culture and Character:
...Made in America is not simply an entertaining narrative history. It is also an argument, or rather a set of arguments, about character and culture. The first is that "modernity" entailed less wrenching and negative change than most today believe. In the realm of culture and society, continuity -- or the intensification of already apparent patterns -- was the rule. Fischer writes, for example, that his is "not one more account of how American character was corrupted by rising individualism, egoism or selfishness." Instead, Americans "remained by Western standards remarkably committed to family, church, community, job and nation." Second, like Potter, Fischer sees abundance as the engine of American history: not simply economic wealth, in his telling, but an ever-increasing stock of security, health, social opportunities, political freedoms, and self-mastery. Third and most significant, he declares a Tocquevillian "voluntarism" -- a highly socialized individualism that led Americans to join groups and build communities -- to be the substrate of national character, the key trait that binds Americans together.
Sunday, July 25. 2010
Encinitas, where I live, is the last refuge of traditional laid back Southern California beach towns. We have the usual run of art shops selling third rate paintings to tourists, any town's laughing-up-our-sleeves joke on the gullible.
But, the beachside bronze paid for by the local Cardiff Botanical Society (WTF does surfing have to do with botany?) has run into disdain for its insufficiently iconic image. Locals don't consider it realistic enough, and aren't to be treated as gullible by purveyers of public art who foist their artistic sense (or not) upon the populace.
The statue, disdainfully titled "Cardiff Kook" by surfers, has been dressed in tutu and bikini, but the latest Encinitans-gone-wild prank is the best yet.
Overnight, a huge papier-mache replica of a great white shark was erected devouring the statue.
The Sheriff Lt. at the scene said, “It wasn’t considered vandalism because there wasn’t any permanent defacing.” The sculptural addition will be removed, to the sorrow of locals and the crowds who consider it an improvement and stop to admire and shoot photos.
Encinitans will strike again.
What public sculpture in your town would benefit from a puckish aesthetic addition?
While feasting on late after-dinner hazelnut gelati a little over a week ago in the relatively non-touristy lakefront village of Baveno, just up from the small piazza on the main drag, we were drawn to the sounds of a church choir, and sat on the stoop of the side door of the sanctuary for a half hour listening to them practice as darkness fell.
Nothing can make a 20-person choir sound like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir the way a small stone 900 year-old church can. Excellent group, too, with an exuberant organist.
Saint Gervaso is the patron saint of Baveno. Like many old buldings in Italy, the church was built of stone previously used in Roman buildings, some still bearing Roman markings and lettering. Recycling. We noted that they never took stones from the Roman bridges or aqueducts, though. Smart - and a conservative message.
This is no famous church, just an ordinary village church. Clearly pre-Gothic. The church and tower were built in around 1100 (but the front of the sanctuary was expanded a bit since then), the Baptistery in 1628, and the open hall of the Stations of the Cross probably in the 1700s, when Baveno became wealthy from its quarries of pink marble (which are still in use).
Palm trees right up there near the Swiss border.
More photos of this small, unknown parish church below -
Continue reading "Santi Gervaso e Protaso: a re-post from 2008"
Saturday, July 24. 2010
Via Dallas News' aviation blog:
Mr. Anubis, in situ.
Can you imagine being a person who is scared of flying, and you do not know that there’s a three story tall statue of the Egyptian god of the dead nearby the runway easement, and you’re in your seat in the takeoff roll, and you look out the window – say it’s night time too – and all floodlit standing there staring at you as you’re going past at 150 mph is – Mr. Anubis ?
or, somewhere nearby also at the Denver International Airport, the Blue Mustang?
A book review. The sonnet form has a punchy compactness that has let it survive and thrive while other antique forms have been mostly abandoned. I have tried my hand at more than a few, and it is good challenging fun.
Thursday, July 22. 2010
Ah, the Florida Keys.
A tropical island paradise.
I honestly don't know if I could describe it any better than I did in Gift Ideas, in the section on Verizon Wireless:
Even out here in the boonies of the Florida Keys I've had superb results. As the freezing winter temperatures plummet into the low upper-mid 70's, I find myself taking my laptop over to the tiki hut, draping the obligatory floral leis around my neck, grabbing my ukulele, greeting the wahinis with hugs and kisses, then firing up the Verizon Wireless so we tropical islanders can tune in to Weather.com and marvel with wonderment and awe at the winter hell our fellow Americans will endure.
Willingly, I might add.
Yep, this is heaven on earth. Make no mistake about it.
Well, at least until you click on a link and see one of these barreling ass over teakettle your way:
So there's that.
Wednesday, July 21. 2010
As an antidote, I assume, to political insanity (like my shirt and duck hunting posts were today) Buddy emails this timely post:
Oscar Greeley Hammerstein's birthday was a few days ago. The New Yorker wrote nearly 1000 songs in his career. In the "Rogers & Hammerstein" partnership enterprise, he wrote the lyrics while Richard Rogers wrote the melody.
OH's parents were immigrants - father a German Jew, mother a - Scots-English (the son was raised Episcopalian). The father is credited with inventing the 'pie in the face' vaudeville routine.
Oscar pronounced his name not as 'hammer-styne' but in the German 'ohmer-schteen'. He spanned the time of America's great rise, born in Belle-Epoch 1895, and left this earth in in the JFK era, as we began to go the moon, in 1960.
Only in America.
And this clip from the eponymous 1955 film of the wartime Broadway hit (it opened in bloody and depressing 1943, when the Axis was yet rampant, and won a Special Pulitzer in the dark year 1944) depicts a time from the turn of the 19th to 20th century.
So we get a layered helping of entertainment here - the great talent and performance, but also three looks at America, all roughly a half-century apart per each.
Wiki doesn't (but should) mention that the familiar hollywood supporting actors are by-and-large not professional singers. The effect of the common (AKA "not all that technically good") voice seems to "break the fourth wall" and charm the audience plumb silly.
Of course the leads, Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones, are sher-nuff professional singers (Jones makes her debut here, but still you have to call that voice 'professional').
 For generations (since 1818), those who need to look well put-together but not Wall Street glam have relied on Brooks Brothers for their basics.
I kinda like the feel of a rumpled normal cotton Brooks shirt, but Mrs. BD and Mrs. Gwynnie recently chatted about how much they can save in dry cleaner bills with the Brooks Non-Iron shirts, which can be washed in the washer and refuse to reach that rumpled look.
The slim-fits and traditional fits (many of them) are half-off right now.
I ask "Why do we always have to spend money to save money?"
Character is what we do in the dark when no one is looking. It is defining.
Today, there's less darkness and more lights.
That may be a hindrance to some, sometimes justifiably and sometimes not, but that's the way it is, and it is preferable to have more character than less, even if forced by fear of exposure. Character is innate as well as a developed habit.
This is particularly so if one ventures into the public arena, as recognized in both our libel laws and common sense. (See here.)
Many of the NAACP meeting attendees openly expressed racism. Many of the Journolist members openly expressed collusion to suppress news via their positions.
That's free speech, and it carries accountability. Furthermore, those among both conclaves, and others, who don't speak up and out are complicit by their silence or non-exit, red-herrings thrown on the path aside and further condemning. And, Journolist founder Ezra Klein similarly misses the point when he says, "If I had thought there was some deep and dark conspiracy to protect, I can guarantee you I would've been a bit more selective." The point is that he founded and ran a selected "progressive" group of many influentials, and their views - although at times differing - were secretly shared to advance their causes. Klein says they should "assume privacy." Nonsense and sophistry, as usual, from Klein's immaturity of age and character.
Conspiracies of silence are as damning as conspiracies of silencing or nefarious abuses.
Monday, July 19. 2010
More of my pics taken last week. Nice little town, Wellfleet. Resident population 2700. Nothing fancy about it. Unpretentious summer getaway with more spots to swim and beach than anywhere I know of, but it is not for those who require warm water.
More pics below the fold -
Continue reading "More Wellfleet, MA architecture"
Sunday, July 18. 2010
 For those in driving distance of lovely and historic Southport, CT, the annual Pequot Library Book Sale is a blast, and coming up soon. Last year, they had 140,000 used books for sale, all sorted by category by the volunteers.
You can purchase, for a pittance, a year's worth of reading material, and will surely stumble into some serendipitous finds that could enrich your life. It's happened to me at that sale, many times over the years.
They have hot-dogs and soda pop, too. You have to bear in mind that the book dealers get there the first day to grab up the valuable and rare stuff, but the prices go down each day.
Our prior post on the subject here.
Say hello if you see me there. I'm the big guy in camo with the turkey etc.
Photo is a typical old house in downtown Southport.
 Sex-appeal still counts for something: Dating Market Value Test For Women. h/t, Dr. Helen
I will not tell you my score.
Friday, July 16. 2010
That's Great Island out there, across from Chequessett Neck. I have done the Great Island long walk several times (8-10 miles). Last time, we saw the resident Great Horned Owl. On this trip, the heat defeated us before we got very far.
I recommend the hike as a way to immerse onself in the salty, piney goodness of the Outer Cape. (Bring hat, sneakers, and backpack with water and things to munch, or you will regret it.)
For me, my annual trek to the Cape is an annual (pagan?) re-baptism. I lived there until I was 5 or 6 (do not remember a thing), but have returned almost every year since then, often with extended family and often not. I believe I converted the now-Mrs. BD to me partly by taking her up there.
Or maybe it was a test to see whether the lovely, spirited young Jersey gal could love something that I loved. She did. Still does.
It is one you cannot do drunk, and other fun topics.
My job, like journalism and electricianism and professorism, is famous for being done by daytime drunks, so I guess it's not a real job. It is, in a sense, parasitic on the producers, makers, and builders - the wealth-creators. I do try to help people with their problems, but my main contribution to the important things is my investing (which has not worked out too well for me during the past decade).
Whenever I am invested in a growing biz, the Dems try to tear it down. What's up with that?
Our shrink friend Shrinkwrapped terms this "possibly the best therapy session ever."
Wednesday, July 14. 2010
I posted tons of Wellfleet architecture a couple of years ago, but here are some fresh ones from last week. Such a small town, I will run out of them fast, having already almost fully and unintentionally documented the village for posterity.
I include the antique, the regular, and the ordinary, while excluding the occasional eyesores.
Continue reading "Wellfleet architectural photo dump #1, 2010 Edition"
From this interesting review of a new bio of E.M. Forster:
“Only connect” makes its entrance shortly after Margaret Schlegel, the novel’s liberal intellectual heroine, is first kissed by Henry Wilcox, the conservative businessman whom she has rather surprisingly agreed to marry. Passion has played little part in their relationship, and though they have gotten engaged they have not yet touched. When Wilcox suddenly embraces her, then, Margaret “was startled and nearly screamed,” and though she tries to kiss “with genuine love the lips that were pressed against her own,” she feels afterwards that “on looking back, the incident displeased her. It was so isolated. Nothing in their previous conversation had heralded it, and, worse still, no tenderness had ensued ... he had hurried away as if ashamed.” A few pages later, Margaret’s reflections on this erotic incompetence lead, as often happens in Forster’s fiction, into an authorial homily...
Forster, like CS Lewis and so many splendid writers, was a sexual innocent. Nothing wrong with that, in my view. Fun and diverting and even bonding as it may be, there is more to life than animal instincts. (Not that we disparage those, here at Maggie's Farm, where the animals shamelessly mate, feed, and drink at the drop of a hat.)
Tuesday, July 13. 2010
This humble old farmstead across the bay from Plymouth Colony was established in the 1650s, and is now within the Cape Cod National Seashore, up one of my secret Wellfleet sand road walking routes in the general vicinity of Duck Harbor.
Many regular visitors to Wellfleet do not know that Duck Harbor used to be a harbor, so this old place was a harborside farm. When currents and sand closed the opening to Cape Cod Bay long ago, most people moved to the big harbor in town (often with their whole houses, too. Lumber was in short supply.)
The original cabins from 1650 are long gone, but I cannot date these structures. Maybe some readers can. This is the main farmhouse, the chimney of which ought to provide a dating clue:
More pics of the farm below the fold -
Continue reading "An old Wellfleet farmstead"
Monday, July 12. 2010
Thanks to Hell In A Handbasket for alerting us to a worthy site, Women's Outdoor News.
And thanks to our buddy for this fine aviation site which we have seen before, Flight Level 390. I want that guy flying my airplane. With the machine on auto 99% of the time, what is there to do but sleep or blog?
It's about the difficulty in knowing what you don't know, and the limits of self-observation. From this site (h/t, Coyote's Arrogant Ignorance):
…people who lack the knowledge or wisdom to perform well are often unaware of this fact. We attribute this lack of awareness to a deficit in metacognitive skill. That is, the same incompetence that leads them to make wrong choices also deprives them of the savvy necessary to recognize competence, be it their own or anyone else’s.
What's a "metacognitive skill"? It's about "the ability to reflect and assess ones' own thinking and understanding."
If I did not suffer from a mild case of Dunning-Kruger, I would not be able to post anything on Maggie's Farm because "I don't know anything, I never did know anything, but now I know that I don't know...":
Sunday, July 11. 2010
Taken out my back door just minutes ago:
You have your backyard scenery, I have mine.
Friday, July 9. 2010
Drowning is almost always a deceptively quiet event. The waving, splashing, and yelling that dramatic conditioning (television) prepares us to look for, is rarely seen in real life.
Thanks to Mario Vittone for this excellent post that everybody ought to read (h/t, reader).
Another good one from Mario: Going Fishing? No You’re Not. Every time you leave shore, you leave safety and, however relaxing and fun it may be, you are entering a dangerous environment on a contraption which is floating at the moment, but wants to sink. If there were no bit of adventure to boating, nobody would do it without getting paid.
It's not that the water wants to kill you but, as a reader commented elsewhere, "Nature doesn't care."
Last I heard, commercial fishing is the most dangerous occupation in America, and unwatched swimming pools are death traps for little kids. I know a couple whose 3 year-old drowned during their poolside cocktail party. Fifty people there, and nobody noticed the little kid slip under.
Story at Neptunus:
|
