... is just green beans with hats.
Why did nobody tell me this? All this time...
Saturday, September 23, 2006
Friday, September 22, 2006
Funniest thing I read today
Together the ruby-red colors and nude photos create an ambience your parents might have called "French whorehouse." To modern sensibilities, the decor might be better described as "ironic, retro-1950s French whorehouse."
Thursday, September 21, 2006
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
Whipped Cream on Top
Today begins one whole week of frivolous frivolity!
Irreverent irrelevances!
Ice cream cake as a reward for months of fiber and vitamin E!
=============================
10 Things I Need to Do around the House
1. Crush the aluminum cans. Man I go through these, three or so a day and I don't wear shoes in the house, so they gather on the breakfast bar and stare at me from across the room. Go away!
2. Sort out DVDs and CD-ROMs. Why do I never never never write on a CD what it is? There are like 30 of them. I used to love CDs, now I realize they are the tribbles from Star Trek. Cuddly and nefarious.
3. Iron clothes. Does anyone know a way to make this not the most tedious job in the world?
4. Rearrange all the books on my bookshelf. Less crazy than it sounds. You'll see. You'll see. It's gonna be great!
5. Rebuild my computer. My computer likes to reboot automatically sometimes. A lot. Imagine what would happen if your main computer died.
6. Burn all of my software and operating system onto DVDs and CD-ROMs in case my computer dies. What, more CDs? Damn them all!
7. Wash my clothes hamper. Long story.
8. Throw out all of the batteries that are dead. Remember when they used to include battery meters, those little strips, when you bought a package of batteries? Now you see a couple of batteries and it's like, have I used those yet? Have I recharged them?
9. Scan and correct photos to upload to Flickr.
10. Go check the calendar to see whose birthday is this month. I am so incredibly bad at that. I don't think I know more than five peoples birthdays, and most of those because they are easy to remember. Heck, I think this was the first year I remembered Annette and my anniversary. In my defense, neither of us ever remember our anniversary.
==============================
Restaurants of the Week
I tried four new restaurants this week, part of a bid to actually learn a little bit about this city that I live in.
Ziggy's -- healthy food, hip place. Elk burgers and pomegranate martinis.
Romano's -- middling Italian but nice salad and big screen for the football game.
Taco Milagro -- mid-scale Mexican, reasonable portion sizes of very tasty fast food. Yummy mole enchiladas and salsa that hits you like a baseball bat.
Los Ranchitos -- dive Salvadoran, basic but tastes like your grandmother made it (if she was Salvadoran). The food on paper plates was served on those woven-straw paper plate holders like Grandma Jennie used to use before she upgraded to those orange plastic kind that could be washed. Ah, memories.
Irreverent irrelevances!
Ice cream cake as a reward for months of fiber and vitamin E!
=============================
10 Things I Need to Do around the House
1. Crush the aluminum cans. Man I go through these, three or so a day and I don't wear shoes in the house, so they gather on the breakfast bar and stare at me from across the room. Go away!
2. Sort out DVDs and CD-ROMs. Why do I never never never write on a CD what it is? There are like 30 of them. I used to love CDs, now I realize they are the tribbles from Star Trek. Cuddly and nefarious.
3. Iron clothes. Does anyone know a way to make this not the most tedious job in the world?
4. Rearrange all the books on my bookshelf. Less crazy than it sounds. You'll see. You'll see. It's gonna be great!
5. Rebuild my computer. My computer likes to reboot automatically sometimes. A lot. Imagine what would happen if your main computer died.
6. Burn all of my software and operating system onto DVDs and CD-ROMs in case my computer dies. What, more CDs? Damn them all!
7. Wash my clothes hamper. Long story.
8. Throw out all of the batteries that are dead. Remember when they used to include battery meters, those little strips, when you bought a package of batteries? Now you see a couple of batteries and it's like, have I used those yet? Have I recharged them?
9. Scan and correct photos to upload to Flickr.
10. Go check the calendar to see whose birthday is this month. I am so incredibly bad at that. I don't think I know more than five peoples birthdays, and most of those because they are easy to remember. Heck, I think this was the first year I remembered Annette and my anniversary. In my defense, neither of us ever remember our anniversary.
==============================
Restaurants of the Week
I tried four new restaurants this week, part of a bid to actually learn a little bit about this city that I live in.
Ziggy's -- healthy food, hip place. Elk burgers and pomegranate martinis.
Romano's -- middling Italian but nice salad and big screen for the football game.
Taco Milagro -- mid-scale Mexican, reasonable portion sizes of very tasty fast food. Yummy mole enchiladas and salsa that hits you like a baseball bat.
Los Ranchitos -- dive Salvadoran, basic but tastes like your grandmother made it (if she was Salvadoran). The food on paper plates was served on those woven-straw paper plate holders like Grandma Jennie used to use before she upgraded to those orange plastic kind that could be washed. Ah, memories.
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
Ethics of Geography
Quick one. When I was in Fairfax, I was able to contribute to local charities with some matching grants from my employer. Now that I am in Houston, the setup is different. There is no particular advantage to giving to any charity anywhere over any other.
So I find myself trying to decide how to give. I know the charities in the Washington, D.C. area, and I started out assuming that I should now support local Houston charities.
This is actually the tip of a much bigger ethical iceberg I don't want to get into right now, but the tip is: how do you decide whether it is better to support a charity in Houston, or Washington, or Louisiana, or Allentown PA, or the Sudan, or anywhere else? I'm not even sure what different arguments ethicists would propose either way.
Thoughts?
So I find myself trying to decide how to give. I know the charities in the Washington, D.C. area, and I started out assuming that I should now support local Houston charities.
This is actually the tip of a much bigger ethical iceberg I don't want to get into right now, but the tip is: how do you decide whether it is better to support a charity in Houston, or Washington, or Louisiana, or Allentown PA, or the Sudan, or anywhere else? I'm not even sure what different arguments ethicists would propose either way.
Thoughts?
Sunday, September 10, 2006
New Orleans
I know I promised in Barcelona pictures, but I wanted to put this up first.
I drove down to New Orleans this weekend, with my little Sony camera. I drove around the city for about two hours taking video, just wanting to get a sense of what the city was really like today.
The good news is that most of the city, especially to the west, looks in good shape. Of course, that means that the video was completely dull, as it only showed rain, windshield wipers, and blurry houses going by.
It was different in the east part of the city, and in the areas by the levees that broke. The video below doesn't really do justice, because in most areas things look sort of okay at first glance but much less so on further inspection. Blurry video from a car in the rain mostly only gives you that first glance. In the worst areas, I was able to slow down or stop, zoom in, and sometimes take photographs that give you a better picture of what it looks like.
I'll let the rest of this speak for itself.
My motel by Louis Armstrong Airport
Chef Menteur Avenue (Northeast New Orleans)
Franklin Avenue (Eastern New Orleans)
Community resentment on St. Claude Avenue (bordering Lower 9th Ward)
Lower 9th Ward (southwest end)
Lower 9th Ward (northwest end)
Lower 9th Ward (northwest end) - On foot
More photos (click to enlarge):
Friday, September 08, 2006
Circling the rim
So much to write, not because it is ready but because it overflows and will be lost. Warm soda volcanoing erupting on ice, spilling. Ice cream overhangs shading cone-sides, creaking.
Circling the rim, I gather up the following:
==============================
"There are people who don’t believe that art has any purpose in a war-torn world, but I suspect that the same people don’t believe it has any purpose on a peaceful world – except as a luxury item. When I think of Glyndebourne Opera, I think of how they put on a new opera, straight after the Second World War, as a reminder of what civilisation and culture actually mean. We hear a lot about fighting for civilisation and culture – strangely enough from the same people who have no time for art. Maybe one day they will join the dots…
...
Oh and listen to the proms and read a few poems. You will be arming your mind instead of arming the world. Me, I am going to do more of everything I love, and do it consciously, not least because time feels short and precious. Or as Mrs Winterson used to say, The Summer is Ended and We Are Not Yet Saved."
========================
"It’s a beautiful day, and there will be many days like this, I hope you are reading this on a day that shines. I love the sun more and more as I get older. I used to long for rain when I was younger, perhaps because it suited my solitary and romantic inclinations. It is true that I am still solitary and romantic, but I find that a spray can of Factor 30 does not get in the way of my thoughts anymore.
I used to think sunshine was a bit frivolous – now I know it is life.
Changing is good, letting in new sensations, feelings, new ideas, is necessary. I don’t want to slowly calcify, find myself like the inside of a dishwasher pipe – just enough room to let just enough water through. I want to keep the spaces open, and to find a way to make for room for difficult beauty – is beauty ever easy? I have not found it so. I’m not even talking about a person, just openness to everything, and even the small daily things, like going out into the garden, or walking down to the river, are beautiful enough to disturb.
Disturb? Yes, I mean to disturb out of the habit of letting life pass in a blur. Looking, hearing, feeling, is disturbing. But better, I think than a muffled world.
I put up a poem this month that seems to me to be about the essential practicality of the poetic vision. You don’t need to be a poet to have a poetic vision. A poetic vision is prepared to be open, to let things in. The exactness of translation, vision into language, is the job of a poet, but the vision itself is probably the job of all of us.
We are grateful to poets because they put into words what we have felt/are feeling. I can’t say enough how important it is to go on feeling.
This month’s poem makes the poet and his poem a thing of practical application. I have never believed that poetry is disconnected from the real world, or is a pretty adjunct to it.
I believe that poetry is a user’s manual – a way of defining what things matter, and, as Coleridge put it, ‘keeping the heart alive to love and beauty.’
Poetry is there when we need it, and we need it regularly. Simply, it turns ordinary life into a meditation, and it reminds us that meditation – the ability to settle and focus and concentrate our energies, is a necessary part of ordinary life.
The whiz-faster, flick-through, hurry-past, phone-in-one-hand-sandwich-in-the-other-got-no-time-for-anything in life is not life, which is why poetry rebukes it. Poetry is slow enough for breathing and blood flow. It prevents cardiac arrest, calcification, and is even good for the common cold."
==========================
Me, I'm trying to decide what to do this weekend, and I have about 2 hours to use the wisdom above to guide me. We'll see.
Circling the rim, I gather up the following:
==============================
"There are people who don’t believe that art has any purpose in a war-torn world, but I suspect that the same people don’t believe it has any purpose on a peaceful world – except as a luxury item. When I think of Glyndebourne Opera, I think of how they put on a new opera, straight after the Second World War, as a reminder of what civilisation and culture actually mean. We hear a lot about fighting for civilisation and culture – strangely enough from the same people who have no time for art. Maybe one day they will join the dots…
...
Oh and listen to the proms and read a few poems. You will be arming your mind instead of arming the world. Me, I am going to do more of everything I love, and do it consciously, not least because time feels short and precious. Or as Mrs Winterson used to say, The Summer is Ended and We Are Not Yet Saved."
========================
"It’s a beautiful day, and there will be many days like this, I hope you are reading this on a day that shines. I love the sun more and more as I get older. I used to long for rain when I was younger, perhaps because it suited my solitary and romantic inclinations. It is true that I am still solitary and romantic, but I find that a spray can of Factor 30 does not get in the way of my thoughts anymore.
I used to think sunshine was a bit frivolous – now I know it is life.
Changing is good, letting in new sensations, feelings, new ideas, is necessary. I don’t want to slowly calcify, find myself like the inside of a dishwasher pipe – just enough room to let just enough water through. I want to keep the spaces open, and to find a way to make for room for difficult beauty – is beauty ever easy? I have not found it so. I’m not even talking about a person, just openness to everything, and even the small daily things, like going out into the garden, or walking down to the river, are beautiful enough to disturb.
Disturb? Yes, I mean to disturb out of the habit of letting life pass in a blur. Looking, hearing, feeling, is disturbing. But better, I think than a muffled world.
I put up a poem this month that seems to me to be about the essential practicality of the poetic vision. You don’t need to be a poet to have a poetic vision. A poetic vision is prepared to be open, to let things in. The exactness of translation, vision into language, is the job of a poet, but the vision itself is probably the job of all of us.
We are grateful to poets because they put into words what we have felt/are feeling. I can’t say enough how important it is to go on feeling.
This month’s poem makes the poet and his poem a thing of practical application. I have never believed that poetry is disconnected from the real world, or is a pretty adjunct to it.
I believe that poetry is a user’s manual – a way of defining what things matter, and, as Coleridge put it, ‘keeping the heart alive to love and beauty.’
Poetry is there when we need it, and we need it regularly. Simply, it turns ordinary life into a meditation, and it reminds us that meditation – the ability to settle and focus and concentrate our energies, is a necessary part of ordinary life.
The whiz-faster, flick-through, hurry-past, phone-in-one-hand-sandwich-in-the-other-got-no-time-for-anything in life is not life, which is why poetry rebukes it. Poetry is slow enough for breathing and blood flow. It prevents cardiac arrest, calcification, and is even good for the common cold."
==========================
Me, I'm trying to decide what to do this weekend, and I have about 2 hours to use the wisdom above to guide me. We'll see.
Monday, September 04, 2006
Safe and sound
Just a quick Hello to let everyone know that I'm back safe and sound. If I can find the special little gray USB cable then I will upload some pictures and videos from Spain, but for now it's on with the clothes washing and picking up the mail... oh the joys of returning from vacation.
Annette is well and lovely as always. Her next visit is six weeks.
Annette is well and lovely as always. Her next visit is six weeks.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
