Monday, August 13, 2007
I have been running on and off most of my life. I have learned a thing or two about my body and how it reacts. Once I was over 30 years old, I found my belly need the occasional discipline of running to keep it from expanding, if you know what I mean. I found that if I ran twice a week, it got easier, but if I ran only once a week, it felt like starting over again each week, as if I had not been getting in shape from my previous runs.
Recently I read about two men who ran every day 55 miles each day for over 100 days. They ran across the Sahara desert. This made me realize that my body is capable of much more than I had ever thought. These men's bodies repaired themselves while they were running! So a few days ago I started running a little. Once again I need some weight control. But instead of running my distance and waiting three days to do it again, I've been running every day.
What I have found is that in the past my body had made little complaints to fool me into thinking I could not do much, that I would need to recuperate for several days.
I would worry about my knees, my heart, my muscles, my tendons. Now I take a half an aspirin just before I go (at my age of 46 I think perhaps I need some startup insurance). And yes if my knee feels a bit tight, I will slow to a walk for a few minutes. But I have found that the idea that my body could maintain itself just fine without a break of several days makes it much easier for me to run and gives my body fewer excuses. I am running the same distance as I would have if I'd been running only twice a week; it is a modest distance, yet one that is not terribly easy for me, perhaps about a mile and a half.
Monday, August 13, 2007
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Journey's End at the Belasco Theatre has excellent characterizations. It a very good play. But the theater itself has a dangerous condition.
I was following an usher showing me to my seat at H16 when bang! my head hit an overhead beam. Many people already sitting down heard the thud and asked how I was, as did the usher. What could I say, my head hurt and I may have had a concussion (fortunately I seem OK now). At intermission I saw another person also hit his head (more gently). I imagine several people every day must injure themselves on this large beam with no warning or padding on it. You basically can't get to your seat without ducking under it. I guess if you are under 5'11" you may be safe. I hope someone brings this hazard to the attention of someone at the theater organization who can do something about it.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Saturday, December 16, 2006
For the first two years of his life, I owned a dog, a dalmatian, that was deaf. Then, when I moved to Massachusetts, I rented a house that allowed pets (very hard to find there), but afraid that he would be unhappy being alone for long hours and longer days, I jumped that the chance to give him to someone I knew he loved. Actually I gave him to a couple who had taken care of him when I was traveling. Sometimes, when I had left him for a few days with someone else, he would pretend on seeing me again that he did not know me. At first I really thought he had forgotten me because he was like that for a day or two. After describing this strange situation to my friend, Ronald Schramm, he explained that children also acted that way when they were angry. I realized that he had not liked being left with the dog watcher. That's also how I knew he loved Margaret and Donny. Every time I went to pick him up, he was happy to see me. So I knew he wasn't mad at me at all. But I digress. The point I want is that he was only my dog for two years. And now he is eleven years old and at my house once again. A very young eleven, I might add. You see, Donny died; and Margaret sometimes has Spot overload. He is very demanding for a dog. (dog is god spelled backward, for those unenlightened, and Spot is a little selfish about his wants . . . . especially demanding frequent snacks and long walks). So he's at my house for a few weeks. But I digress again.
The point is that I went to a holiday benefit for the aesthetic realism foundation. They had a silent auction -- I bid on dinners, art supplies, bottles of whiskey, and a gorgeous table which I now have. After the party I went back home, got Spot, went for a little walk and stopped back at the foundation on Greene Street. They had a long checkout line for the auction winners that I had not had the time to wait on, given that I had a dog to walk. Well, you know, don't you? Spot hit the tail end of the party like a diva bowing to his fans. Everyone ( at least the portion of the people there who loved dogs -- and there were many) came up to say hi. Spot love the attention and the delicious smells. I told someone that he was so friendly really because was hoping for snacks after having had some at Patagonia's store and at BofA. But I saw the horrified look I received. I felt bad too. Putting down my own dog. That is really against everything that ethical realism stands for. OK I admit I know next to nothing about ethical realism. However, unlike you, I looked up their website. They do not like the idea of putting down other people -- you should see things from their points of view too. And Spot's point of view is clearly that strangers are sweet when they have some food to offer and they is not what he was used to before.
Saturday, December 16, 2006
Monday, November 13, 2006
It's November in New York City, and I have mosquitos in my SOHO apartment. They are small mosquitos, and they hide well; they have been biting me every other day, leaving itchy welts. Sometimes they buzz me too. So far I've killed one (I got a good look at it's swatted carcas). I don't know how many there are, since I actually never see more than one at a time. I don't know if they are living in my apartment or flying in. Last week it got quite cold, so I thought they must be living here; this week it's much warmer.
All summer long I had no mosquitos: I'm really not prepared. And I might add that a week ago I came down with a nasty unexplained fever and head and body aches. I'm still getting over them.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Listening to "Fear of Flying" on tape -- it is read magnificently by Hope Davis -- I delighted in the first few hours, and was rather bored by the rest.
The book does make you think; it has lots of "ah ha" moments, when you realize something Erica Jong is getting at is so true. Somethings it just brings back my own memories. Like here: Her character Isadora is being romanced at a cafe by the sexy, flitatious Englishman Adrian soon after meeting at the registration desk of a congress of psychiatrists in Vienna. She thinks about his name Adrian Goodlove. She says, "what did you say your name was?" And mentions that is the climatic line from Strindberg's Miss Julie. Huh? I look up Miss Julie on the web. A play by the 19th century Swedish playwright where the servant has been played with romantically by the daughter of the Count, bring the impossiblity of romance between different stations and the recognition that the people are really not that much different except for the viewpoints caused by their relative leisure (or lack of it). OK, I haven't read the play yet, just a review.
Well, the point that Jong is making is somehow lost on me, but still some memories come. Like when I walked (or was it biked?) past an imposing oceanfront house in Quogue and saw a beautiful girl on the lawn who smiled at me and who I instantly fell in love with, but saw no possibility of her having an interest in me, a poor boy summering in Hampton Bays. It seems incredible to me now, but it took me forever to get past some notions of class and wealth learned from where? From movies? Parents? Fairy tales? I don't no. They seem laughable to me now, but probably still influence my psyche. Not that I had anything to be ashamed of at the time. It was just that she lived in the big expensive house that I wished my parents lived in and somehow that could divide us. Yes, fairy tales were always suggesting something great was inaccessible, except by some miraculous effort.
Adrian was a Laingian. That makes me wonder if perhaps in real life he was in fact R.D. Laing. And perhaps the conference was the 1967 Congress of the Dialectics of Liberation, held in London. I looked through the web and found no one else suggesting this :-) Isadora was supposed to write about the Vienna conference -- I would have thought she'd be rushing to the Dialectics conference, as I myself would have, if I had been the right age.
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Saturday, October 14, 2006
I have recently talked to people who have calculated how many tons of polution people in various countries create each year. The waste is from water for washing, carbon from burning fuel, garbage thrown away, etc.
Actually a big part of the waste is the weight of the water. The total weight of all waste per person in countries differs due to lifestyle. I do not have a link to this data at the moment. However, I have decided to make a separate calculation for future comparison.
What is the weight of the waste the human body each year. It seems to me that a big part of this would be air exhaled. About every 4 seconds we take a breath. If we are not doing much, that is about an eighth of a gallon (a pint) of air. That works out to 15 pints per minute or about 2,700 gallons a day and 985,500 gallons a year.
At room temperature air weights about 0.075 pounds per cubic foot A cubic foot in turn is about 7.481 gallons, so a gallon of air weighs about 0.01 pounds or about 1/6th of an ounce.
Therefore we each breath out about 9,855 pounds or about 5 tons of waste air every year. What about water?
We consume about 4 to 5 pounds of water every day (including the water in our food) and obviously must expell about the same amount. That's about 1650 pounds or less than an ton per year.
Saturday, October 14, 2006
Saturday, July 29, 2006
I almost said "let me look in your purse for you" as the old lady next to me at the coat check was having trouble finding her ticket. We were leaving the party at Christie's for Nan Kempner's new book RSVP about the tables and menus at the fabulous homes she had eaten dinner at.
But there is a certain distance that strangers in New York feel between each other -- afraid that their solicitousness may be misinterpreted. I although we exchanged a few words, and she found her ticket, I didn't know what to do about the possibly dottie old woman next to me. So when my coat came I walked away, leaving her at the counter and feeling sorry.
I walked to the other end of the room and watched her. No one else was at the checkout counter, although there were some groups of people talking to each other in small clumps about the room. She took her mink, threw it easily across her shoulders and walked into the center of the room and soon out the door. I had thought she was in her late 70's and did not recognize her (well, we had never met and I'm really bad at remembering faces anyway). But I did soon after see her picture. Now I read that Brooke Astor is 104! She must have been 98 or 99 then and I feel even worse about this little moment of "life goes on, so don't wait to help an old lady on with her coat" and at the same time thrilled that at that age she still got on so well all by herself.
Saturday, July 29, 2006
Thursday, March 16, 2006
When I was young, a walk on the street meant passing may older women and men who had great difficulty walking. They would shuffle with canes or strollers or struggle with no help at all along the sidewalk. Now I no longer see many old people struggling along.
What has happened to them? Does the new generation now sit at home, waiting for home delivery and taking an occassional walk around the room or on a very slow tredmill? Have they been moved out to retirement communities in Florida and Arizona? (I live in Manhattan).
Or, as I suspect, has hip and knee replacement surgery become so frequent that the elderly now skip instead of stumble?
Thursday, March 16, 2006
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
One of the artists who congregate on weekends in front of my apartment house entrance died last week. He was 53 and died of colon cancer that was diagnoised a month earlier. When I had first seen him after I moved here about a year and a half ago, he seemed ill to me. Later when I started talking to him and found him very agreeable, I stopped noticing. His death has caused me sadness; I am sad for him. And I think about other people I have known who have died. I tell myself it is something everyone has in common that they will die and their friends will as well. Some young in an avoidable plane accident like JFK, Jr. or an unavoidable one like a high school sweetheart, Serena Wudunn. Some come close to death because of bad health and make it through OK. Other's, like my old apartment-mate's mom, don't.
There was my beloved junior high school ancient history teacher whose affection for his young male students caused him to do something with one he soon very much regreted; he ended his life with a gun. Stanley Kops would walk around the class and sometimes massage the boys' shoulders while lecturing. It never bothered me, but I did not realize its deeper meaning.
Of course my dear grandparents which is a whole and long story in itself.
And there was Tim McGinty -- a very nice guy in my law school class. Law Review, too. After graduation, if I understand it right, he travelled around the world, picking up some rare parasite or disease; after a year in the hospital, he died. Another classmate killed himself, perhaps because he could not be admitted to the CA bar because of being arrested for protesting war while on the university campus: I'm not really sure why and I much regreted having been out of contact at the time.
I am fortunate really in not knowing too many people who have died. It seems rather odd to me -- there is my high school classmate Daniel Barr who recently died of cancer and my friend Donny McComiskey whose lungs gave out a few years after rescuing people at the world trade center and then staying on for the clean-up. I guess I know that the more I think of it the more people -- some of them very dear I will remember. There's the girl on my block who I first showed me mine for her showing me hers. She died at sixteen as a passenger in a car accident. And the guy who punched me all the time in eighth grade. He was a driver.
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
Friday, November 18, 2005
I've been reading Jack Kerouac's Dharma Bums about his search for meaning in life in hiking and contemplation. So ah-ha -- I jotted down a few words about Douglas's secret true Buddha nature. But I'd hardly finished a sentence when I realized I'd never be able to convince anyone that Douglas has a true Buddha nature.
The following day I've thought back on how it has happened that he lacks a secret true Buddha nature. I wondered if he used to have one and has lost it over time.
I tried to bring back my early memories of him; one that comes to mind is that he would never say "uncle", even though someone bigger might be sitting on top of him. Was that evidence of a Buddha nature – perhaps not. Would a bodhisattva say "uncle" ? It is hard to tell for sure. But let's say a bodhisattva would not say uncle and that it was evidence of a Buddha nature.
As the decades have whizzed by, has Douglas followed that early impulse down the Dharmic path to its logical conclusion? Has he given up the hedonistic pleasures of food and drink? Or has he transferred from a love of chocolate milk to one of chardonnay? Has he taken to asceticism in all things? Or only those that polite society require. Has he eliminated his self or expanded it so as to be completely detached or in complete harmony with the rest of the world?
While, yes he has maintained a discipline and determination suggested by his early unwillingness to say "uncle", he has not in other ways sought to remove himself from the world at large in order to find inner quiet required for Buddha nature. And though we may debate tonight the benefits or drawbacks endlessly, we will not find that secret nature. Douglas is destined alas for many future lives.
However, it is to many future birthdays in THIS LIFE that I give my toast.
Friday, November 18, 2005
Sunday, January 23, 2005
With the talk recently about the rivers of liquid methane that once flowed on Saturn's moon Titan, I am reminded of an article I once read in the Atlantic Monthly. The article described a theory that the earth's oil is of primordial origin. Not made from decaying plants and algae, but in huge pools deep in the earth from its original formation. A proponent of this theory is Thomas Gold. Let me just get this post out to say I think the arguments are convincing. Serious efforts should be made to find what may be virtually limitless deposits of oil. It would not help any of the existing large producers, since the price would decline, but it would help the rest of us.
Sunday, January 23, 2005
Thursday, October 07, 2004
The F train is the coolest subway route in the Manhattan and I’ve only just discovered it! It goes from the ultra hip Lower East Side to the ultra conservative Mid Town East Side. The Lower East Side now has all those great bars and restaurants like ‘inoteca on Ludlow and Rivington. At 63rd Street and 3rd Avenue the F train has the most amazing entrance. You have to go down four separate long escalators, so deep into the interior of the earth. It is so different from the other lines that you feel like you are in some other city, maybe Washington, DC. Outside Manhattan it goes to two islands, Roosevelt Island (where I’ve never been) and Coney Island, and to Forest Hills.
Thursday, October 07, 2004
Tuesday, October 05, 2004
In his book Adventure Capitalist Jim Rogers mentions that in traveling through Gambia he saw many French, German, British and Swiss woman. At first he didn't understand why, then it soon became clear that they were there as what some are calling “romance tourists”. They came singly to pair up with young local men.
I am a bit surprised! Thinking some more about this reminds me of Truman Capote’s last book, Answered Prayers; it is about a gigolo who has relationships with both men and women in the literary and eventually the high society international crowds. Woman sometimes pay for sex too.
Tuesday, October 05, 2004
Thursday, September 23, 2004
Lost post
The recent suicides at NYU are disturbing. I wrote a really good post about this a few days ago, but it got lost in transmission. I thought I had lyrically pinpointed the kind of despair that leads to suicide and the reasons it is worth waiting instead of acting. Here goes a more prosaic effort.
Two weeks ago a graduate student at the film school took off all her clothes and jumped off an NYU building. Perhaps the NYU student had revealed a suicidal proclivity when she made a student film about a man who sent his son to Coney Island and then killed himself. Her death reminds me of another time life imitated art. The father of a friend had written a novel in which the protagonist killed himself. Later when my friend was a teenager his father did what his fictional character had done. There have been six other student suicides at NYU in the past year. In the years before there were others In Boston I had a friend who moved to San Francisco. Her brother was in the graduate school of business at NYU when he killed himself about two and a half years ago.
Although I know the rough details of only a few of the suicides, it seems that the students are popular and dynamic, not outwardly depressed.
A few days ago, sitting at a café I met a NYU undergraduate film student who said that he had heard that one of the NYU students had eaten mushrooms before jumping; he said the mushrooms made the student think he could fly. Could there be a drug connection in more of the suicides, I wondered out loud. No, that would be too easy an answer.
People who kill themselves usually have a kind of despair of living; not being alive seems like a better alternative. It could be that the future seems hopelessly bleak, that anything good that might happen has already been ruined by what has already happen, or that the present is just too hard to live through.
Life often seems like a timeline with a long history (the past) leading up to a present. The present sometimes painfully inches forward, on its way changing the future into the past. Sometimes the present zooms by really fast like we have no control over events.
But when a person feels like not living, it always worthwhile to wait. Life has an incredible way of surprising, given time, as if changing the colors of a picture, giving a different view of the same problems, even sometimes letting you see something obvious that you just could not see before.
Always wait.
Thursday, September 23, 2004
Sunday, September 19, 2004
Mayor Bloomberg has recently made efforts to reduce noise in New York City. Noise from ice cream trucks blaring loud music, noise from construction on the streets, perhaps some other kinds of noise too. It is a great idea to reduce unnecessary noise in this city with so many people living so close to each other. And there is one potential target that I’d suggest creates more annoying noise than any other: honking.
The city should enforce laws on unnecessary honking. I see (and hear) it all the time: a car is slow to start as a light turns green, a taxi stops to pick up or drop off a passenger, a car pauses to let people cross the street or when a car can’t turn because a side street is backed up. It doesn’t matter if it is three o’clock in the morning, they will honk.
What you may ask is the solution? Tickets. Not high priced $100 tickets that the police will be reluctant to hand out. $10 tickets. And lots of them.
What else? There is something else. Taxi meters. That’s right, give each taxi about 5 honks per twelve hours. That’s typically one shift. Any more – charge them. $0.50 a honk should do it. Adding to the honking epidemic is that drivers notice that other cars honk frequently. And think “since everyone else is doing it, why shouldn’t I?” Since taxis are a large part of the city traffic, reducing the amount of taxi honking will go a long way toward stopping the copycat honkers
Sunday, September 19, 2004
Tuesday, August 31, 2004
I wrote this on the bus 2nd Avenue bus as an exercise. I thought I would re-write it ten times in different ways. Dialogue, points of view, style changes, etc. But so far it hasn't been done.
Why Waste Food
There are many convincing reasons not to waste food, but the more I think about the “people are starving in China” indoctrinations that mothers tell to their skinny children, the less I am convinced that wasting food is a bad thing. Actually I’ll tell you why I think it is a good thing.
People are starving in Africa, in India, but not here. What I don’t eat here isn’t going to get to them. Sure I could save some money by not eating as expensively or buying as much and send that money to them. But I could do the same with my rent or clothing. The money I could send really hasn’t much to do with the food I use myself. Basic food for starving people is not that expensive.
Here there is an abundance of food; all varieties, high quality. And that is why we should waste it. Just think what would happen if there were a few bad crop years. A couple of blights of some kind that reduce farm production, kill off the cattle, etc. Seven good years and seven bad, as the bible once suggested. Well we could have a food shortage – we who have so much. Therefore I think it is better to use more than we need now, so that it will be easier to reduce in the future.
I might add that for a long time the US government was paying farmers not to farm and also buying grain and just storing it. I think they have stopped doing these things; perhaps we should all individually store some food.
Another reason that it is good to waste food is the weight problem. So many are over weight and even those who aren’t are trying not to become over weight. When you go to a restaurant, you are inevitably served a huge portion – more than you would ordinarily plan to eat. Since it is there in front of you, you start eating and before you know it, you are finishing the last morsel of that tasty dish. Well I find it helpful in the exercise of willpower and restraint to sit down with the intention of wasting food. At least plan to leave some leftovers.
Tuesday, August 31, 2004
Saturday, August 28, 2004
Several weeks ago to lose weight I decided not to eat. I thought about how every year I don’t eat or drink for the 24 hours of the Jewish new year. How much easier it would be just not to eat! So I stopped eating. My immediate motivation was that a girl I liked had told me how she’d lost interest in a guy after he gained weight; he was no longer sexy. And I myself have always had a major aversion to becoming fat. But it has a way of creeping up – last winter when my mother came to visit me in St. Barths, she told me she was very thin because she had had a flu for a month. During that month she had no appetite. As it turned out, she still didn’t – unless I was eating too. I ate to get her to eat and we both gained weight.
After I started fasting I thought about the man in London who had caged himself in a hanging platform for over a month with no food. And of the “hunger artist” from Franz Kafka I had read in college. I was curious: is it harmful to fast? And if not, for how long? I knew that experiments with mice showed that under-feeding them increases their life spans. I thought that my energy level would probably decline after a little while.
My current method of choice whenever I have a question is to search the web. There I learned about juice fasts – not eating but drinking juices – that are surprisingly in vogue. Some people fast for a week, others for a month. Some combine fasting with meditation. Some have been said to fast for 60 days. There was information about the physiology of fasting. The first few days use up amino acids; then your body switches to lipids.
As I fasted I found that on two or three occasions I had a real urge to go have a big breakfast. I told myself I could go do it, but when the morning came I resisted and waited until I no longer felt the urge. The first day or two I ate something – a banana I think. Each day I said to myself tomorrow will be the last day. And then tomorrow came and I thought why not go another day. I took long walks and found myself full of unexpected energy. I was reminded of the pet mice I had as a child that would scramble around with lots of activity when they were hungry. A biological reaction to help them find food I had thought. Eventually I fasted for four and a half days. I found it a tremendously liberating experience as I realized that I was not dependent on eating food every day or even every week.
I found that having some juice made the fasting much easier in terms of how well or not tired I felt. It seems that the brain is especially glucose dependent, so having a little each day makes the fasting process easier. Drinking juice or eating a banana didn’t bother me and made sense – a little food is more natural than none at all. And it shouldn’t hurt my ability to lose weight. Except for a couple of short times when I desired to eat, I was never hungry – even at the end of my fast. I estimate that after the four and a half days I lost about 2 pounds of pure fat. Fat goes a long way in storing energy. I had read a book by William Bebee about the Galapagos. He told how the giant tortoises would be captured for food by boats passing by. They would be kept in the ships’ holds for six months or more with no food – and unfortunately they tasted delicious when finally eaten. I realize now that people, especially overweight ones, also have a surprising ability to go without food.
I would have easily kept fasting longer. I stopped because I was going to an important meeting and thought I should be well fuelled. In retrospect I don’t think it made a difference: I would have been just as alert if I hadn’t eaten. But, oh how good that food tasted! Though I wasn’t hungry and didn’t scarf down the soul food I bought, everything tasted full of delicious nuanced flavor with bright tastes like it had when I was a child. The collard greens, the turkey, the banana bread pudding – each burst with its own flavors.
Saturday, August 28, 2004
Thursday, August 26, 2004
In May I went to Roscoe with my brother to try fly fishing. We were able to stay at a cottage connected to a beautiful small manor. We went to one of the stores there, met a guide, got fitted with waders and bought a fishing license. Then we drove to the stream.
I saw some amazing things on this fly fishing trip. And I learned a lot of surprising things about how some flying insects are born. For instance the troutlike to eat Mayflies that rest on the surface of the stream. But these Mayflies only are on the stream a short time. They are born underwater as some kind of aquatic bug. One day they start to turn into a flying insect and rise to the surface where they stay until their wings dry out and they fly away.
I saw an ugly bug that looked like a cross between a beetle and a tick crawling out of the water up our guide's boot. What do you think it was? A dragonfly nymph. It was trying to crawl onto land to turn into a dragonfly. And it had a lot of company. Looking carefully on the shore I could see (with a little pointing out) lots of these half inch brown bugs. And they would start to wiggle and squirm. Eventually they'd break a hole in their skin just around the neck and stick out a head with giant eyes. Then they'd stand with their front legs on top of the shell of their old selves as they tried to pull out their wings and long tails. The wings would be all rolled up and gradually unroll. After about a half hour, they'd fly away on cellephane-clear wings. I hadn't even known they ever lived under water or that they metamorphosed.
I could say a little about fly fishing, but I'll just mention that you have to watch your fly lure very closely to see if a fish is checking it out. That is not easy to do.
Thursday, August 26, 2004
Wednesday, December 17, 2003
I have been incredibly delinquent in writing to my blog; I sincerely apologize to all (any of?) my loyal readers and promise that I will start to say all the wonderful things that I thought about blogging, but have not.
For the moment a quick, quick update: I was travelling a lot. Mexico -- Merida and the Yucatan; Mongolia -- where I gave a talk and now have a pad in Ulaan Baatar; China -- Beijing and Chengde; England -- Bristol, Salcome, London; Bermuda by sailboat and then on to St. Martin and St. Barths.
Wednesday, December 17, 2003
Sunday, June 29, 2003
I was listening to the tape of Melissa Bank's excellently written book, "The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing". She uses lots of short sentences, reminding me of Hemingway. They are like this (I'll make some up): "I sat. I sang. I read. I waited. I walked " And she goes on.
Anyway what I am getting at is this: at one point in the book the female character (who I assume to be always right) says something like "Don't eat that fortune cookie or the fortune won't come true." And the guy spits it out.
I was absolutely flabbergasted. I thought you had to eat the fortune cookie to make the fortune come true. And for so long I had been getting good fortunes, thinking that my luck was good, eating the cookie to make sure, and then eventually wondering what happened. Why didn't the cookie do its work? I finally stopped believing in the cookies. And now I find out I had been doing it all wrong.
Sunday, June 29, 2003
Saturday, June 14, 2003
Well I know I haven't been saying much and many of my loyal readers are wondering why. For the moment I'd like to tell a story that I already put somewhere else on this vast website, somewhere so remote that it may never be view by a human eye (mine own not counting). A place where even search engines never go. OK, I'll admit it, I originally put it there on purpose.
Bridgehampton Mobil
When I was about 19, I took a summer job at the full service Mobil station in Bridgehampton. It was owned by a gruff old-timer who had retired to small town life from running big gas stations on highways.
We would have all kinds of celebrities stop in most of whom I didn't know at all, but one was Duffy, Truman Capote's other half, and a writer himself. A very nice man. Now the station -- right to the Southeast of the flag pole -- looks abandoned. It hasn't operated in years.
One day two drop dead beautiful, thin, tall 25 year olds drove up in a bright shiny volkswagen bug. They both got out and one of them walked up to my boss and said "pump me, please." He and I looked at each other, since she had not driven up to the gas pumps, but closer to the garage.
He said "what?" And she said a perky, "Pump me!" My boss said to me "Geoff, you handle this one." I was certainly gratified and a bit surprised. I guess he thought he better stay out of truoble with his wife.
What she really wanted was air in her Michelins. I obliged.
Miss "Pump me!" girl, if you are out there reading this, I know you are now 47 or so, but please drop me a line. It is always a good time to check that tire pressure!
Saturday, June 14, 2003
Wednesday, April 23, 2003
Today on C-SPAN2 Dawn Calabia from the UN Information Center said that last year the world spent $850 billion on armaments and $5 billion on humanitarian assistance. That's 170 times more on armaments!
For several weeks now I have been thinking that the US's traditional methods of defense -- bombers, armies, air craft carriers -- is not optimized to deal with terrorist threats. Some countires -- like Saudi Arabia and its Wahhabi beliefs -- have been financing education in other countries to imbue their particular religious beliefs in children. And while the US doesn't overtly support particular religions, there is much we can do in viewing humanitarian aid and education as a way to protect ourselves, as a way of defense.
For many years people who wanted to help people overseas faced the argument in the US that went: "Why should I give any money or help to anyone in a foreign country? If I want to help someone, I should do it at home. The person I might help in another country might as well be in another world as far as I am concern, and I just don't care about them."
Now I believe we have a clear answer -- some of that money we have been spending on weapons systems would have been better spent from a defense point of view on education and humanitarian assistance.
Wednesday, April 23, 2003
Monday, March 17, 2003
We have all been listening to speculation on the TV news about whether the "non-combatants" that the US has captured in its war on terrorism are being tortured to make them give out information about plans for terrorism. Some of the captured terrorists (and I call them terrorists assuming that they are guilty -- which some of them may not be -- though the idea of being "guilty" raises its own questions about how to define and judge the crime) have been brought to or kept in foreign countries or perhaps given to foreign governments to interrogate. Torture is a hot issue partly because of the moral implications, but also because of the international agreements preventing the torture of prisoners of war (thus the term, ""non-combatants").
One thing I have not heard any discussion about, and which anyone who has watched a spy movie or read a spy book in the past 20 years knows about, is the use of truth serums to make the prisoners talk. It is virtually inconceivable that the US is not pursuing drugs as a method for getting the prisoners to talk. Yet not a word about it in the media.
Why? The answer is obvious to those who know how censorship works in the US: the media has been asked by the government not to discuss the subject on the grounds of "national security". And the media comply, as they almost always do.
Why do the TV and newspapers go along with the "national security" gag? That I am not too sure about; perhaps the big companies are afraid of losing licenses. Perhaps they want to avoid lawsuits and possible prison time. Perhaps they do not want to appear unpatriotic. Perhaps they really believe that the national security will be threatened by open discussion of using drugs to find information.
Monday, March 17, 2003
Sunday, March 16, 2003
I also had been thinking a bit more about the "Julie Christie" song. It is kind of amazing for a musician to have their work used in a movie. The musician sends out her creation and really has no idea how it might be used if it ever gets into a movie. It could be background music to a scene -- that could be a love scene, a murder scene, a fishing on the pond scene.
In this case the scene was an actual dramtized performance of the song itself. And it transformed the song completely into something that almost no one would have thought of when they first heard it .... or at least it seems that way to me. As T.S. Elliot once said: "I can't get that jingle out of my head."
Sunday, March 16, 2003
Recently I have been doing a little musing on the quantity of water vs. gasoline that I use. Sad to say, I use more gasoline than I do water. (Well, let's include oil in that calculation too). Perhaps that will change as the summer comes and I take longer showers. :)
Sunday, March 16, 2003
Thursday, March 06, 2003
Recently I bought a DVD of "Better than Chocolate", a movie I had liked on HBO (late night). The DVD has a great feature: the director, Anne Wheeler, voiced over the entire movie, making comments as she see the different scenes. She talks about the actors, putting the film together, the props, etc. Of course the DVD also can play the film without the directors comments.
A year or two ago after first seeing the film, I made an effort to find out who write it; I sent her (Peggy Thompson) an email saying how much I liked it and that I looked forward to reading her other works. I have been disappointed that she never wrote back. I wonder about the relationship between the writer and the director. How much did the director change from the writer's script? Apparently a lot. How much of that was not OK with the writer? They often have no say . . . . yet from what I had read in some articles on the web, I had the impression that they were friends.
After listening to the director's comments, I realize that the movie succeeded for me in spite of her. If she had a clue about the poignancy of the relationship between the two young women who fall in love, she seems to have lost it in the years it took to make the movie and the surveys done to find out what is bothering the modern young lesbian. She brought in a friend or two to play the "comic" roles of a trans-sexual and of the young women's mother. While these actors certainly added to the film, the director's comments about the editing make it clear to me that she went over-board to focus on them, while cutting scenes that are more key to the movie's powerful emotional plot. The plot of the girls' coming of age and of the censorship they face as lesbians.
What does come through in this movie for me and why do I like it? First I like how it treats art; especially two of the scenes where the young woman (who I think the story should have focused more on) are creating art -- in the first they paint themselves and use their whole bodies to make two big canvases. In the second they take a barrel, fill it with books, then water, and freeze it. Emptying the barrel they are left with a frozen block of books which starts to melt. Another really artistic point is the sign of Lorraine Bowen's "Julie Christie." The neon faces and boots creates an effect that can't be beat. I emailed her (she replied). And I ordered a fun CD straight from her in England. (send cash). Lastly and perhaps most importantly, every time I see the movie, it makes me cry. Why? I think it is the struggle of finding what you want in life and going for it, in spite of all the adversity and tries to prevent you. Especially if you can do it when you are young.
Thursday, March 06, 2003
Friday, February 21, 2003
I am very happy these days: I have discovered that I can combine my two favorite drinks -- making a third favorite. I love to drink tea. I drink it every day. I also love scotch. Sometimes I drink single malt scotch. Well I had heard of a "hot toddy", but never thought tea could be part of the equation (or scotch for that matter). But put them together with a little extra sugar (I use succanut, unrefined sugar), and what do you get? A delight for the tongue; a balm for the spirit. Just a little scotch in the tea will do fine. Or of course you can add more and that is great too. Amazingly, they bring out the flavor of each other in a delightful way.
Friday, February 21, 2003
Monday, December 30, 2002
I went to see the second Lord of the Rings movie. The way the love between the man Aragon and the Elfish princess was portrayed reminded me of the story of Luthien Tunevial and Beren from the Silmarillion. Luthien was a elvish princess who came across Beren in the forest. His king father had sent him on an errand and when he got back he found his whole village had been destroyed by auks. Beren snuck up on them and killed the leader and fled. He was recovering in the forest when he heard Luthien singing and fell in love. A little later when she saw him she fell in love too; after living together in the forest, they went to the kingdom for Beren to ask Luthien's father King Thingol for her hand. But he was loath to give it to a mortal and very foolishly said "Bring to me one of the Silmarils in your hand and you can have her." That was foolish because first one of his kingdom's biggest rivals had sworn that the Silmarils were theirs -- having been taken by Morgoth from their ancestor who created them -- and they would fight whoever had them to get them back. And second because Morgoth had them and did not want to give them up. (There were three).
Well this is a really wonderful heroic love story about how Beren said "When you see me again, a Silmaril will be in my hand" and left to go take it from Morgoth (the King of Evil)'s crown. And how Luthien, held captive by her father, escaped with the help of Huan, the talking dog, to aid Beren. With Luthien's powers of singing to sleep and Beren's unrivalled bravery, they succeeded in taking a Silmaril. But on the way back Carcharoth, one of the horrible wolf monsters that Morgoth had created to protect his hellish underground castle Angband, bit off Beren's hand holding the Silmaril. Later as they went home and Beren was dying from the poison of the bite, Huan attacked the monster and killed it, but died in the process. This incredible huge dog had the ability to speak only three times in his life. He used all these times to help Luthien and Beren. He and Luthien even killed Sauron in rescuing Beren which is why later Sarron is only a disembodied spirit. The Silmaril was taken from the monster's stomach still in Beren's hand; now the king had it and was obliged to grant the marriage. Beren slowly died from the poison even though Luthien worked hard to save him with special herbs. Elves live forever unless they are killed in battle or die from grief.
Men are destined to die, but nobody knows what happens after they die -- if anything. Elves on the other hand had been created by the Valorian and go to a special happy waiting area if they are killed in battle or die from grief. After the worlds’ end, their lives will continue. Luthien died of grief soon afer Beren's death. In Mandos her beautiful sad singing moved the head Valinor, those highest living creatures who are like gods (but had themselves been created). He agreed to help her grief. Luthien was offered a choice -- either come to live in Valorian with the Vala and never remember her love for Beren or become mortal herself and bring Beren back to life too. She chose the latter. She and Beren went to live out their lives in the forest where they lived together in a house away from everyone. They were never heard from again. Or did they have a couple of children? Yes I think so.
Monday, December 30, 2002
Saturday, December 21, 2002
Just back from Southampton -- and I have to report that I saw carolers walking through the village dressed in black capes and red capes and top hats and bonnets. I asked -- they were a group from the First Presbyterian Church called "Treasure the Music" and carol every saturday. Wouldn't you know it . . . two weeks of saying nothing and then I eat my words the same day!
Saturday, December 21, 2002
A couple of weeks ago I went to the fireman's Christmas parade and carol sing in Southampton. The firemen's trucks were covered in colored lights, prancing reindeer and really superlative decorations. Some were antique trucks.
Everyone was excited. The cold weather and the parade had been late in starting; perhaps because of the delay, more and more people had lined the streets. I loved the parade, but was disappointed by the carol sing afterwards.
The carolers waited patiently on stage in the cold for a long while before starting -- I give them credit for that. But the sing was organized poorly. First they had set unloaded trucks of huge speakers six feet tall -- enough for a major rock concert. Sure the singing was loud, but also not at all intimate.
What really surprised me was what they sang -- ten second snippets of the popular Christmas songs in quick succession. It was like we were listening to a commericial on TV for a Christmas song CD: "And here are quick previews of all your favorites." The singers themselves were quite good, but why waste them with mega speakers and a tasteless repertoire?
I thought back to when I lived in Marblehead, a small sea swept town in Massachusetts with a rich history. I remember the Christmas carolers split into groups of three or four and without any microphones walked through the streets, stopping to sing a song or tow in a shop doorway and then moving on a little. They were dressed a bit for the part, as well --- Marblehead is big on marching fife and drum bands walking down the street for any historical occasion -- and the carols dressed like .... well I can't quite remember, but like carolers -- whilte scarves, .ancient look.
Saturday, December 21, 2002
Friday, December 06, 2002
My brother left for Ethiopia two days ago on, you guessed it, Air Ethiopia. He will be making a visit to Uganda on his two week trip. Part of the trip will be visiting a clubfoot clinic in Uganda and attending a medical conference in Ethiopia. The other part -- visitng wild animals at the game parks. He was always much braver than I. Not that I am afraid of wild animals; it's the people who worry me.
FrolickFult is growing older -- count the days -- but I have to admit that I don't visit him often. (You haven't forgotten him already have you?)
Husi has asked for some help getting computer equipment and software to the school at which he is teaching for the Peace Corps. The school is right under Mount Kilimanjaro. Kusi has been put in charge of computer literacy. I suggested that maybe he could get some help from the Computer Clubhouse. I will be trying to contact them on his behalf.
Enough about them, what about you, you ask? Well, not intending to change the subject at all I answer, I have been browsing through other people's blogs. I saw a very interesting one by a teacher at Northfield Mount Hermon School. He is a great writer, really sensitive and thoughful, and teaches the art of blogging, er, I mean, Media Arts.
Today I found another blog by a student who had an excellent long 5 page wish list at Amazon.com. Not that I want to read all these books, but I am glad to know that they exist. I think I will add A Field Guide to Demons, Fairies, Fallen Angels, and Other Subversive Spirits to my own list.
Friday, December 06, 2002
Tuesday, November 26, 2002
Today I went to neopets.com and created FrolickFult, the Aisha. I have to admit I don't really know what FrolickFult can do, but maybe I will find out this weekend when Kang Kang, the 2.5 year old who speaks French, English and Chinese, comes over for a Thanksgiving weekend. I think he will be able to explain it to me.
Tuesday, November 26, 2002
Thursday, November 14, 2002
A friend called tonight to let me know that Veronica of "Miss Vera's Cross-Dress for Success" fame would be giving a talk at the Gershwin Hotel. She and I had stumbled in the other night for a comedy show. It was full, but we found other entertainment in the lobby as it was "Sauna Fest" night with people lounging in towels (only) as they sipped drinks after coming down from the sauna tent on the roof. Others were frantically pulling off their clothes in the back room to make it up to the sauna as soon as possible. We liked this hotel and comparing notes found that we had both stayed in the same cool San Francisco hotel, Triton. I have to say though I did notice on couple standing at the front desk wih a look of "we came to New York for a nice vacation and what has happened to us? Help! Is this Rocky Horror in real life?!"
Thursday, November 14, 2002
|
|
