Category: allthethings
in loving memory
There’s an old road, out by Westport, that’s not accessible by car. It leads about a mile and a half on a gentle path, some hills but not that bad. At the end, on a hill that would be overlooking John’s River State Wildlife Area, there’s an old graveyard.
Crimewave by Crystal Castles
Lake Chelan, Apr 1 + 2 2016
I was fortunate enough to visit Lake Chelan with my daughter last weekend.
Jeb Bush’s “Please Clap” mp3 notification / alert / ringtone
1950’s-1980’s Scifi Pulp “If”
The Internet Archive has made all backissues of pulpy sci-fi mag “If” available for free online. This is a wonderful gift, full of that heady optimism for the future that early sci-fi had.
Chvrches – Clearest Blue
Are You Mine?
“Are You Mine” is a soft song. There’s a sweet sadness, a sense of vulnerability and acceptance in the song. It’s made all the more poignant by the liner notes:
“I live with my mother, who has Alzheimer’s.
In the house she’ll stop me, put her hand on my arm, and dearly ask, ”Are you mine?”
I say back to her, ”Yeah momma, i’m yours.”
The collection of salt and pepper shakers in the video, were her mother’s.”
March 11
The fool who is angered, and who thinks to triumph by using abusive language, is always vanquished by him whose words are patient.
On Altruism in the New York Times
We were sitting in Grant’s office one afternoon talking about efficiency, when he said: “The truth is, I don’t care how many articles I publish or how many words I write. Productivity is an imperfect way of indexing how much I’m contributing, how I’m using my limited time to make the most difference.”
It wasn’t until I was transcribing the conversation a few days later that I realized that when he referred to his limited time, he wasn’t just talking about a busy schedule; there was a more existential tug in the phrase. I brought it up with him by phone.
“It’s the kind of thing I almost never talk about,” Grant said. “But my responsibility is to be open.” Mortality, he said, was the one subject that gave him something like panic attacks. He had always felt that way, since he was a brainy, sensitive kid playing basketball in his driveway, staring at the sun, suddenly terrified of what would happen when it burned out. That was why he first wanted to be a scientist — before he realized biology bored him and he would never reinvent physics — so he could help figure out how to extend life, or at least design the spacecrafts that he is sure, even now, will take us to safer planets if this one runs dry. Mortality, he said, is “something I can’t fix. I can’t do anything with or about it.” He can’t let himself think about it too much; he has lost days at a time to his anxiety, “to the point that it’s the equivalent of extreme physical pain.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/31/magazine/is-giving-the-secret-to-getting-ahead.html?_r=0