Watch out for. .. the poisonous fish!
Humor
Juxtapositions We Might Wish Didn’t Come to Mind
Netflix’s infinite riches include a series of 4 dvds of the complete Beckett. Neither of us has ever been a big Beckett fan & I keep falling asleep (surprise surprise), so I suspect we will stop with the first; sometimes I wonder how people decided to keep going during those years. (Scotus wondered why we were doing this during the holidays – it seems more a mortification appropriate to Lent.) To wake up, I trawled the humor sites & brought some links back.
The fifties were also a time when conventions were all male & a chance to get to the big city. Iowahawk shows us Chicago before most Chicagoboyz were born, but when people knew how to party. 606 makes an appearance, if 666 does not.
On a more contemporary note, Zucker offers a short comparison often made here as well. But dropping an allusion doesn’t make us laugh (if sadly).
Iowahawk also reruns What Happens in Davos Stays in Davos to welcome Eason Jordan back to Iraq.
Chicagoboyz Offers Advice
Today’s wisdom from Kristofferson:
“I think between us, Bill Clinton and I have settled any lingering myths about the brilliance of Rhodes scholars.”
“Never go to bed with anyone crazier than yourself.”
Hot trend: portable turf.
Why I’m Not Good At This Political Stuff
Is anybody else disturbed by mentions of Virginia Postrel and breast implants in the same sentence?
Now, I don’t look at Virginia and see, oh, this; I’m hosting my share of anti-veneration memes. But in spite, or perhaps because, I have met Virginia (and helped put together a stop on her book tour for The Substance of Style [overwrought review warning]), there are certain political issues that really, really don’t overlap with the circle labeled “VP” in my internal political Venn diagram.
I don’t care that Virginia herself has written on the topic; and in particular, I don’t care that I of course agree that these kinds of medical decisions, and the management of any attendant risk, ought to be decentralized, ideally all the way to the level of the individual adult, even if that means practically shutting down the FDA.
I just don’t care. My inner Midwesterner wants to metaphorically leave the room, sputtering over how unseemly it all is. If this is the price of defending (or regaining) freedom, somebody’s going to have to substitute for me until we can move on to a more edifying topic. Like, I don’t know, nanotechnological bionic hornets or something. Call me when this is over.