I have a long-standing habit, I call it the “binge read.” In college, I went on binge reads of Philip K. Dick and Larry Niven and Orson Scott Card and Ernest Hemingway, where I would gather as much of an author’s body of work as I could, and then I would read all of itContinue reading “On Things I’ve Been Reading”
Monthly Archives: July 2010
On Sarah Palin and the 2012 Election
Should Sarah Palin, the Republican Vice Presidential nominee in 2008 and the former governor of Alaska, run for President in 2012? Some Republicans want her to. And, curiously, some Democrats want her to as well. At the Netroots Nation Convention, a gathering of progressive activists, over the weekend, a straw poll there gave Palin theContinue reading “On Sarah Palin and the 2012 Election”
On Daniel Schorr
I have a routine on Saturday mornings. I fix coffee. I listen to Weekend Edition Saturday with Scott Simon. And one of the things I listen for each week is Simon’s weekly discussion with Daniel Schorr. Simon tweeted a few minutes ago that “My longtime friend and colleague Dan Schorr has died. Please find aContinue reading “On Daniel Schorr”
On the Loss of a Watch
Yesterday, I lost my wristwatch. There’s nothing profound to the story. It’s a case of simple human mistake-making. This happens. At some point, maybe five years ago, I stopped wearing a watch on a regular basis. Actually, it was more recent than that, come to think of it. After I moved to Baltimore. I hadContinue reading “On the Loss of a Watch”
On Stephen Fry’s New Television Series
Stephen Fry — writer, actor, all-around personality — has revealed that he will be making a series for BBC2 on language — Planet Word. I haven’t seen a good documentary about language, where it comes from, how we speak it, the variations of it, whether languages are dying, whether we are better at speaking thanContinue reading “On Stephen Fry’s New Television Series”
On Movies When I Was Twelve
Courtesy of Dayton Ward, “The ‘When I was 12’ movie meme thing.” Here’s how it works: go to Wikipedia (as the most convenient resource), and copy the list of movies that were released in the year when you were 12 years old. Mark in italics the movies that you’ve seen. (Not necessarily that year.) MarkContinue reading “On Movies When I Was Twelve”
A Tale of Two Baseball Caps
Yesterday, the Stars & Stripes Washington Nationals Baseball Cap arrived. Baseball teams started wearing patriotic baseball caps on national holiday weekends a few years ago. (And yes, the Toronto Blue Jays have their own patriotic cap, with the Maple Leaf instead of the Stars and Stripes.) Despite my love of the Cubs :cubs: I don’tContinue reading “A Tale of Two Baseball Caps”
On Story Ideas Rattling Around
When it comes to writing, I like to play with form. I’d point to “The Spindle of Necessity” as perhaps the pinnacle of my “playing with form” — the story is a four-part Socratic dialogue, complete with scholarly introduction (and, had I the room under the word cap, it would have had footnotes!) — butContinue reading “On Story Ideas Rattling Around”
On Friday Morning Randomness
This week, we’ve had pleasant weather. Until today. Today is going to be a scorcher. Temperatures at the triple-digit mark. And then! Maryland was struck by an earthquake! With all this bad in the world, with the Earth itself being greatly wroth, what’s a person to do? What can a person use to distract himselfContinue reading “On Friday Morning Randomness”
On Writing Styles I Emulate
Here we are, nearly a month past Bloomsday, and what do I discover? I write likeJames Joyce I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing! James Joyce! 😎 Except that it’s F. Scott Fitzgerald I really try and emulate… :-/ Thanks to David McIntee for the link…