The Fox Is Aloft
Sweet Junie and I completed the grouting step on the fireplace base and
applied the first coat of sealer. Not bad. Now, what to do about the
remaining ugly pink tile? I could chisel those off, too, but tiling with
slate on the vertical may be a bit daunting. Just paint the suckers?
Hmm.
~~~
A conservative opines in
Salon, "Get over your Obama Derangement Syndrome": "I have recently received
commentaries that claim that "Obama's speeches are unlike any political speech
we have heard in American history" and "never has a politician in this land had
such a quasi-religious impact on so many people" and "Obama is a narcissist,"
which leads the author to then compare Obama to David Koresh, Charles Manson,
Stalin and Saddam Hussein. Excuse me while I blow my nose."
~~~
Junie
and I watched Seven Pounds last night and liked it. All the actors
did a fine job, and Will Smith easily beat my expectations.
Rosario Dawson is a lovely and talented romantic lead, and Woody Harrelson
does a good job in a role that doesn't involve him acting crazy or killing
anyone. The plot has a little of the mystery of a The Sixth Sense
(though the flashbacks get a little confusing at times), and there are some nice
quirky touches.
Recommended fare for this movie: Whole-wheat spaghetti with pesto, toasted
pine-nuts, and freshly grated Parmesan. Big salad of mixed greens with
lemon-garlic dressing. Este de Bodegas Alto Almanzora red wine (about $8
and delicious).
~~~
Kelli completely got me with her April Fool's
post.
~~~
Jane continues to amuse: "Finally persuaded to withdraw from GoodReads, a site where folks rate their readings. A "friend" gives The Communist Manifesto four stars. I mean, it's pretty good, but it's no New and Selected Poems of Franz Wright."
~~~
I received Ivy's
Mortal in the post yesterday, all 19th century-ish in brown wrapping
paper and a postmark from Wales. Very cool, and very nice work.
~~~
From GME: "Three-dimensional maps of coastlines were carved of wood as long as three hundred years ago. These Inuit charts were usually carved from driftwood and are made to be felt rather than looked at.
"
~~~
News from The
Poetic Front includes "A Poetics of Sparsity: Refusing Authoritative Interpretations in Souvankham Thammavongsa's Found" and an interview with
Sharon Mesmer.
~~~
The Fox is aloft.
~~~
From Culture
Industry: "But Travels in Arabia Deserta is not merely an
incomparable travelogue, but an eccentric masterpiece of English prose – an
idiom which Doughty felt had only gone downhill since Spenser and Chaucer. Like
his contemporary G. M. Hopkins, Doughty favors an out-of-the-way, Anglo-Saxon
vocabulary, and constructs his sentences around Biblical, sometimes recondite
cadences."
~~~
Fabulous: German retro-futuristic group-dancing.
~~~
An interesting
article in Time explains why, like passengers on an air flight, no two
students pay the same tuition at most private colleges. It basically comes
down to MSRP and who pays retail and who doesn't. It drives me crazy to
hear that "college tuition has increased at twice the rate of inflation for two
decades" without ever hearing any reporter ask the obvious question: Why
the hell IS that? My father put four kids through college and for half of
that time was a major in the army. Now, it takes from 100% to 200% of a
family's after-tax yearly income to finance 4 years of on-campus college.
For most families, that at least a decade of serious savings, to the exclusion
of other savings options (like retirement).