Anecdotal Evidence
'Time Is Tight'
My brother is
dying as he lived – stubbornly. He has been in hospice for two weeks and is...
4 months ago
My brother is
dying as he lived – stubbornly. He has been in hospice for two weeks and is failing
incrementally. On Monday we were swapping memories and he stopped talking on
Tuesday, the same day he stopped eating. He lies on his back on the hospice
bed, mouth open, eyes staring...
Anecdotal Evidence
'A Joker; One Who Breaks a Jest'
When I
encountered the word witcracker in Much Ado About Nothing, I marked it for
further use and...
a year ago
When I
encountered the word witcracker in Much Ado About Nothing, I marked it for
further use and found myself silently singing it to the tune of “Matchmaker,Matchmaker” from Fiddler on the Roof:
“Witcracker, witcracker, / Make me a wit . . .” In Shakespeare’s Act V, Scene 4,...
This Space
A rare sort of writer
Today is Gabriel Josipovici's 80th birthday. To mark the occasion, I'll link to various posts I've...
over a year ago
Today is Gabriel Josipovici's 80th birthday. To mark the occasion, I'll link to various posts I've written over the years – after a brief interlude.
I read him first in July 1988 after borrowing The Lessons of Modernism from the second floor of Portsmouth Central Library because...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Old Landor's Bones Are Laid'
On Tuesday I
wrote about Walter Savage Landor, his poems and especially Imaginary Conversations, a...
4 months ago
On Tuesday I
wrote about Walter Savage Landor, his poems and especially Imaginary Conversations, a collection of 174 dialogues, mostly of
historical and literary figures, published in five volumes between 1824 and
1829. I keep a mental list of books I admire and enjoy that seem...
The Marginalian
The Science and Poetry of Anthotypes: Emily Dickinson’s Herbarium, Recreated in Hauntingly Beautiful...
On September 20, 1845, the polymathic Scottish mathematician Mary Somerville — the woman for whom...
a year ago
On September 20, 1845, the polymathic Scottish mathematician Mary Somerville — the woman for whom the word scientist was coined — sent a letter to the polymathic English astronomer John Herschel, who six years earlier had coined the word photography for the radical invention of...
The Marginalian
How to Make a World: A Poem
Like mathematics, the truest metaphors are not invented but discovered. In fact, they hardly feel...
11 months ago
Like mathematics, the truest metaphors are not invented but discovered. In fact, they hardly feel like metaphors — they feel like equations equating something previously unseen with something familiar in order to see more deeply into the nature of reality. One morning out on a...
The Marginalian
Making Space: An Illustrated Ode to the Art of Welcoming the Unknown
It is the silence between the notes that distinguishes music from noise, the stillness of the soil...
4 months ago
It is the silence between the notes that distinguishes music from noise, the stillness of the soil that germinates the seeds to burst into bloom. It is in the gap of absence that we learn trust, in the gap between knowledge and mystery that we discover wonder. Every act of making...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Half the Pleasure of Reading New Books'
“[M]ost
American boys are hurried into active life so early, that even the few who have
the...
a year ago
“[M]ost
American boys are hurried into active life so early, that even the few who have
the possibility of developing literary taste have scarcely time to do so. Unless
they read the great English classics in high school and in college, they never
find time to read them.”
In...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 The Many Lives of Null Island
At risk of ruining the secret for you, Null Island is a long-running inside joke among...
5 months ago
At risk of ruining the secret for you, Null Island is a long-running inside joke among cartographers. It is an imaginary island located at a real place: the coordinates of 0º latitude and 0º longitude, a location in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Africa where the Prime...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Adieu! for Once Again the Fierce Dispute'
Among John
Keats’ closest friends was the modestly gifted poet John Hamilton Reynolds...
a year ago
Among John
Keats’ closest friends was the modestly gifted poet John Hamilton Reynolds (1794-1852).
It was to Reynolds that Keats wrote in a February 3, 1818 letter:
“We hate
poetry that has a palpable design upon us—and if we do not agree, seems to put
its hand in its breeches...
The Marginalian
O Sweet Spontaneous: E.E. Cummings’s Love-Poem to Earth and the Glory of Spring
The ultimate anthem of resistance to the assaults on life.
a year ago
The ultimate anthem of resistance to the assaults on life.
Anecdotal Evidence
'Always Singular, and Never Trite or Vulgar'
“He was
never seen to be transported with Mirth, or dejected with Sadness; always
Chearful, but...
a year ago
“He was
never seen to be transported with Mirth, or dejected with Sadness; always
Chearful, but rarely Merry, at any sensible Rate, seldom heard to break a Jest;
and when he did, he would be apt to blush at the Levity of it: His Gravity was
Natural and without Affectation.”
The...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Everyone He Knew Something About'
A reader who
enjoys the novels of Sinclair Lewis tells me she is put off by the length and
dullness...
2 months ago
A reader who
enjoys the novels of Sinclair Lewis tells me she is put off by the length and
dullness of Mark Schorer’s 1961 biography of the Nobel laureate. I haven’t read
Lewis since high school and have never read Schorer’s 867-page behemoth but I
sympathize. I remember reading...
Anecdotal Evidence
'By Studying Little Things'
“He advised
me to keep a journal of my life, fair and undisguised.”
So did my high-school
English...
6 months ago
“He advised
me to keep a journal of my life, fair and undisguised.”
So did my high-school
English teacher two centuries later. Boswell took Dr. Johnson’s advice and
later mined the resulting journal when assembling his Life of Johnson (1791). Much of Boswell’s London Journal...
The Marginalian
May Sarton on the Art of Living Alone
"The people we love are built into us."
a year ago
"The people we love are built into us."
The Marginalian
Hermann Hesse on What Books Give Us and the Heart of Wisdom
Books show us what it is like to be another and at the same time return us to ourselves. We read to...
a year ago
Books show us what it is like to be another and at the same time return us to ourselves. We read to learn how to live — how to love and how to suffer, how to grieve and how to be glad. We read to clarify ourselves and to anneal our values. We read for the assurance that others...
Anecdotal Evidence
'An Echo of a Song a Stranger Sang'
I’m reminded
of my age only when someone holds a door open for me (That’s my job!) or performs some...
3 months ago
I’m reminded
of my age only when someone holds a door open for me (That’s my job!) or performs some other courtesy. I was returning to
my car from the university library, carrying a canvas tote bag of books, walking with the aid of my cane, as usual, when a
young man asked if he...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 archives.design
A digital archive of graphic design related items that are available on the Internet Archives.
Visit...
5 months ago
A digital archive of graphic design related items that are available on the Internet Archives.
Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
Escaping Flatland
On having more interesting ideas
“To write well, all you have to do is cultivate your mind and then write what you see.” When I talk...
8 months ago
“To write well, all you have to do is cultivate your mind and then write what you see.” When I talk to people who have worked with their ideas seriously for 10+ years, it feels like I can throw any topic on them and they’ll have an interesting idea, or if not an idea so at least...
The Marginalian
In the Dark: A Lyrical Illustrated Invitation to Find the Light Behind the Fear
The mind is a camera obscura constantly trying to render an image of reality on the back wall of...
a year ago
The mind is a camera obscura constantly trying to render an image of reality on the back wall of consciousness through the pinhole of awareness, its aperture narrowed by our selective attention, honed on our hopes and fears. In consequence, the projection we see inside the dark...
Josh Thompson
Finding an Edge
These last two weeks have been the hardest, or the most frustrating, of my time at Turing so...
over a year ago
These last two weeks have been the hardest, or the most frustrating, of my time at Turing so far.
I’ve been put a little off-balance by this difficulty, and I think I’m close to uncovering some useful tidbit or idea that will serve me well, and might serve someone else...
ribbonfarm
Intellectual Menopause
I ran across the alarming phrase intellectual menopause a few months ago in John Gall’s...
5 months ago
I ran across the alarming phrase intellectual menopause a few months ago in John Gall’s Systemantics, and it naturally stuck in my brain given I’m pushing 50 and getting predictably angsty about it. The phrase conjures up visions of a phenomenon much more profound and unfunny...
Josh Thompson
Find out how much money you've made (in your entire life)
This post went by on the Personal Finance subreddit today:
https://www.ssa.gov/myaccount/
After...
over a year ago
This post went by on the Personal Finance subreddit today:
https://www.ssa.gov/myaccount/
After creating an account / logging in, click on Earnings, then add the columns. If you have been working for many years, try copying/pasting the column in excel and using the sum...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Now You Are Elsewhere'
I came late
to the poet Henri Coulette, long after his death in 1988 at age sixty, and
promptly fell...
10 months ago
I came late
to the poet Henri Coulette, long after his death in 1988 at age sixty, and
promptly fell for his charms. Chief among them are elegance, technical
virtuosity, wit and devotion to his native turf, Southern California. Like one
of his favorite writers, Raymond Chandler,...
ben-mini
Root Canals and Bill Gates
In Finding Nemo, there was a scene about a root canal surgery that absolutely terrified me:
This...
7 months ago
In Finding Nemo, there was a scene about a root canal surgery that absolutely terrified me:
This could just be me, but I spent a remarkable amount of my childhood worrying about root canals. Horror stories like these created a universal phobia that dentists suck and that’s...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Winter Came in August Killing Fruit and Seed'
A sad and
sorely final yet incomplete tagline found after a poem in the Winter 1986 issue of The...
2 months ago
A sad and
sorely final yet incomplete tagline found after a poem in the Winter 1986 issue of The American Scholar:
“Edward Case’s
work has appeared in various journals, including the New Criterion, the Wall
Street Journal, and Modern Age.
This poem was taken from a collection of...
The American Scholar
The Snow Maiden
Our final episode of 2018 is a send-off to the solstice
The post The Snow Maiden appeared first on...
2 weeks ago
Our final episode of 2018 is a send-off to the solstice
The post The Snow Maiden appeared first on The American Scholar.
The Marginalian
Favorite Books of the Year: Art, Science, Poetry, Psychology, Children’s, and More
Because I read for the same reason I write — to fathom my life and deepen my living — looking back...
a month ago
Because I read for the same reason I write — to fathom my life and deepen my living — looking back on a year of life has always been looking back on a year of reading. This year was different — a time of such profound pain and profound transformation that it fused reading and...
The American Scholar
Our Pets, Our Plates
In defense of the furred and the hoofed
The post Our Pets, Our Plates appeared first on The American...
7 months ago
In defense of the furred and the hoofed
The post Our Pets, Our Plates appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'New Eyes Each Year'
From 1955
until his death in 1985, Philip Larkin worked as a librarian at the Brynmor
Jones Library...
10 months ago
From 1955
until his death in 1985, Philip Larkin worked as a librarian at the Brynmor
Jones Library at the University of Hull, eventually becoming its director.
Although Larkin complained about the time-consuming nature of the job, taking
him away from poetry and other writing,...
Josh Thompson
On Leaving Evangelicalism And Opposing It
Content warning & summary
This paper talks about ethics, ethical behavior, violence, abuse,...
a year ago
Content warning & summary
This paper talks about ethics, ethical behavior, violence, abuse, complicency, domination and oppression. It’s a condimnation of evangelicalism, but not, necessarily, any particular evangelical. There are those within evangelicalism who are ethical,...
The Marginalian
The Transcendent Brain: The Poetic Physicist Alan Lightman on Spirituality for the Science-Spirited
A largehearted invitation to "stand on the precipice between the known and the unknown, without...
a year ago
A largehearted invitation to "stand on the precipice between the known and the unknown, without fear, without anxiety, but instead with awe and wonder at this strange and beautiful cosmos we find ourselves in."
Anecdotal Evidence
'An Ill-Assorted Collection'
A friend has
broken up with her boyfriend and he is launching protracted salvos of nasty
emails in...
3 months ago
A friend has
broken up with her boyfriend and he is launching protracted salvos of nasty
emails in her direction. As prose they are better than average. There have been
no threats of violence and little profanity. The ex’s weapon of choice is a
detailed critique of every aspect...
The Marginalian
John Gardner on the Key to Self-Renewal Across Life and the Art of Making Rather Than Finding...
"The potentialities you develop to the full come as the result of an interplay between you and...
8 months ago
"The potentialities you develop to the full come as the result of an interplay between you and life's challenges."
The American Scholar
As I Walked Out One Morning
The post As I Walked Out One Morning appeared first on The American Scholar.
3 months ago
The post As I Walked Out One Morning appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'A Moralizing Purge of the Past'
"I think we
are living through a moralizing purge of the past, similar to the one that
early...
9 months ago
"I think we
are living through a moralizing purge of the past, similar to the one that
early Christianity inflicted on the same pagan learning. There will be another
Dark Ages in our lifetimes; and another Renaissance, too, but not one that we
will live to see.”
I’m...
The Elysian
Elysian gatherings around the world
Picnic with me in New Zealand, Australia, Japan, and San Francisco.
a month ago
Picnic with me in New Zealand, Australia, Japan, and San Francisco.
sbensu
Vibes are music, arguments are lyrics
Losing My Religion is not about religion and Arguments are not about arguments
5 months ago
Losing My Religion is not about religion and Arguments are not about arguments
Josh Thompson
Parenting: A Place for Sources And Stories
As some of us are or might be, I “am a parent”, or I “have a child”, or something like that.
This is...
7 months ago
As some of us are or might be, I “am a parent”, or I “have a child”, or something like that.
This is complex for me to write and engage with, because something that is certainly true for all of us is that we “have a parent” or we “have been a child”. To talk about any of it is to...
Anecdotal Evidence
'He Doesn't Want to Read'
In a comment
on last Friday’s post, my friend John Dieffenbach asks about bibliophile:
“Is that a...
a year ago
In a comment
on last Friday’s post, my friend John Dieffenbach asks about bibliophile:
“Is that a ‘lover
of books’ because they are books? A lover of reading books? A lover of reading
certain books? What makes one bibliophile more of a bibliophile than another?
Size of the...
ribbonfarm
Arbitrariness Costs
I’ve long held that civilization is the process of turning the incomprehensible into the arbitrary....
8 months ago
I’ve long held that civilization is the process of turning the incomprehensible into the arbitrary. The incomprehensible can be scary but the arbitrary tends to be merely exhausting. Unless the stakes are high, such as in paperwork around taxes or passports and visas. Then the...
Ben Borgers
Thursday, January 20, 2022
over a year ago
Journal and Links by...
🔗 High Desert Road Map
From Morongo Valley to 29 Palms, there’s plenty to explore. Here are a few of our favorite...
6 months ago
From Morongo Valley to 29 Palms, there’s plenty to explore. Here are a few of our favorite places.
Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
ribbonfarm
Bangalore Meetup Report
Did a ribbonfarm meetup in Bangalore last night, the first ever in India. Thanks to Abhishek Agarwal...
7 months ago
Did a ribbonfarm meetup in Bangalore last night, the first ever in India. Thanks to Abhishek Agarwal for organizing. I think this is the first meetup I’ve done since the last Refactor Camp in 2019. It was kinda last minute, which is why I only posted on Substack rather than here...
Ben Borgers
Your Feelings Are Not Unique
over a year ago
Anecdotal Evidence
'Uneven, Irregular, and Multiform Movement'
“There are
readers—and I am one of them—whose reading is rather like a series...
3 months ago
“There are
readers—and I am one of them—whose reading is rather like a series of
intoxications.”
Driving while
reading is discouraged. Once, in Bellevue, Wash., while stopped at a red light,
I was intoxicated by the book propped against the wheel until a cop pulled up, rolled...
The Marginalian
Endling: A Poem
I turned the corner one afternoon to find my neighborhood grocer gone. No warning, just gone —...
11 months ago
I turned the corner one afternoon to find my neighborhood grocer gone. No warning, just gone — padlocked and boarded off, closed for good, a long chain of habit suddenly severed. We know that entropy drags everything toward dissolution, that life is a vector pointed at loss, but...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Smart Quotes for Smart People
Good typography uses smart quotes, not dumb quotes.
— Jason Santa Maria
Visit original link → or...
4 months ago
Good typography uses smart quotes, not dumb quotes.
— Jason Santa Maria
Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
The Marginalian
Thich Nhat Hanh on True Love and the Five Rivers of Self-Knowledge
“For one human being to love another: that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks… the work...
11 months ago
“For one human being to love another: that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks… the work for which all other work is but preparation,” Rilke wrote to his young correspondent. The great difficulty of loving arises from the great difficulty of bridging the abyss between...
The Marginalian
Something in You Hungers for Clarity: Ta-Nehisi Coates on Writing
“Words have more power than any one can guess; it is by words that the world’s great fight, now in...
a month ago
“Words have more power than any one can guess; it is by words that the world’s great fight, now in these civilized times, is carried on,” Mary Shelley wrote in the middle of the Napoleonic Wars that laid the template for the colonialist power structure of the modern world, in an...
The Marginalian
The Cosmogony of You
We live in a state of perpetual dissociation from the almost unbearable wonder of being alive....
a month ago
We live in a state of perpetual dissociation from the almost unbearable wonder of being alive. Wonder is always an edge state, its edge so sharp it threatens to rupture the mundane and sever us from what we mistake for reality — the TV, the townhouse, the trauma narrative. If we...
The Marginalian
How Emotions Are Made
"Emotions are not reactions to the world; they are your constructions of the world."
11 months ago
"Emotions are not reactions to the world; they are your constructions of the world."
Anecdotal Evidence
'Books I Have Liked'
One way to
classify readers is by their choice of reading matter across time. Some are
specialists....
a month ago
One way to
classify readers is by their choice of reading matter across time. Some are
specialists. They read deeply but narrowly, only science fiction or the Latin
classics in translation. That strategy is alien to me because by nature I’m an
omnivore, moving from Henry James to...
The American Scholar
Laura S. Lewis
Welding trash into treasure
The post Laura S. Lewis appeared first on The American Scholar.
8 months ago
Welding trash into treasure
The post Laura S. Lewis appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'That Excellent Judge, Posterity'
A reader can
sometimes judge the true worth of a writer by the quality of his detractors....
9 months ago
A reader can
sometimes judge the true worth of a writer by the quality of his detractors. Take
Dwight Macdonald on James Gould Cozzens. And then consider Arnold Bennett
(1867-1931). Today he’s judged a respectable but minor English novelist, something
of a documentarian, if he’s...
The Elysian
No one buys books
Everything we learned about the publishing industry from Penguin vs. DOJ.
9 months ago
Everything we learned about the publishing industry from Penguin vs. DOJ.
The American Scholar
In Reprise: Next, Line Please
A new poetry prompt for players new and old
The post In Reprise: Next, Line Please appeared first on...
2 months ago
A new poetry prompt for players new and old
The post In Reprise: Next, Line Please appeared first on The American Scholar.
Astral Codex Ten
The Early Christian Strategy
...
2 months ago
Robert Caro
In Florida, the Pitch Is High and Hard
A special Senate committee has opened an investigation into these “Misery Acres” that take dollars...
a year ago
A special Senate committee has opened an investigation into these “Misery Acres” that take dollars from people who cannot afford it.
The Marginalian
The Last Wonder: D.H. Lawrence on Death and the Best Lifelong Preparation for It
"Know thyself, and that thou art mortal. But know thyself, denying that thou art mortal."
a year ago
"Know thyself, and that thou art mortal. But know thyself, denying that thou art mortal."
Robert Caro
An Interview With Robert Caro and Kurt Vonnegut
Kurt greeted us in his beautiful 19th century house and in his bare feet (of which more later). As...
a year ago
Kurt greeted us in his beautiful 19th century house and in his bare feet (of which more later). As the interview progressed it grew sort of
The Marginalian
18 Life-Learnings from 18 Years of The Marginalian
Somewhere along the way, you realize that no one will teach you how to live your own life — not your...
2 months ago
Somewhere along the way, you realize that no one will teach you how to live your own life — not your parents or your idols, not the philosophers or the poets, not your liberal arts education or your twelve-step program, not church or therapy or Tolstoy. No matter how valuable any...
The American Scholar
“The Last Words of My English Grandmother”
Poems read aloud, beautifully
The post “The Last Words of My English Grandmother” appeared first on...
6 months ago
Poems read aloud, beautifully
The post “The Last Words of My English Grandmother” appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'One of the Disadvantages of Wine'
An offhand
recounting of a conversation with Dr. Johnson:
“He has
great virtue, in not drinking...
4 months ago
An offhand
recounting of a conversation with Dr. Johnson:
“He has
great virtue, in not drinking wine or any fermented liquor, because, as he
acknowledged to us, he could not do it in moderation. Lady M’Leod would hardly
believe him, and said, ‘I am sure, sir, you would not carry...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Carrying On, Backing Out, Moving on
But to my original remark, I’m backing out of Meta Corporation platforms. Maybe that’s all I mean....
2 months ago
But to my original remark, I’m backing out of Meta Corporation platforms. Maybe that’s all I mean. It’s the election, of course, and its campaigns. It’s the devolution of news and journalism and the rise of manipulative and untruthful media. It’s all kinds of things. Lies and...
Josh Thompson
62 lessons learned after one year of full-time travel
Kristi and I
put together a non-comprehensive list of things we’ve learned while traveling full-time...
over a year ago
Kristi and I
put together a non-comprehensive list of things we’ve learned while traveling full-time last year.
Samples:
Kristi
1. Josh and I are such a good team, and we balance each other.
We’ve figured out our strengths and how to contribute to our successes together. It’s...
Anecdotal Evidence
'A Kind of Masochism Afoot in Modern Aesthetics'
“Is there a
kind of masochism afoot in modern aesthetics whereby the leaden and the dull
acquire...
6 months ago
“Is there a
kind of masochism afoot in modern aesthetics whereby the leaden and the dull
acquire significance simply because the beaten spirit would seem to claim more
seriousness than a more robust struggle with the exigencies of things?”
This
elegantly crafted question, at...
The Marginalian
Youth and Age: Kahlil Gibran on the Art of Becoming
A roadmap to the fulfilled belonging on the other side of "the great aloneness which knows not what...
a year ago
A roadmap to the fulfilled belonging on the other side of "the great aloneness which knows not what is far and what is near, nor what is small nor great."
Anecdotal Evidence
'The Soul of Reading!'
Don’t invariably
mistake a digression for sloppy storytelling. True, a clumsy storyteller will...
3 months ago
Don’t invariably
mistake a digression for sloppy storytelling. True, a clumsy storyteller will digress
out of sheer rambling confusion and indifference to his audience. My father was
like that. We arrived at some destination and he would promptly relate the
details of the...
Anecdotal Evidence
'What American Beauty Should Be'
An old
friend called and reminded me of the September almost forty years ago when we
hiked along...
4 months ago
An old
friend called and reminded me of the September almost forty years ago when we
hiked along Otter Creek in southern Vermont near Dorset. Often we hiked in Otter Creek, which is filled with granite
boulders. It was less hiking than climbing horizontally. Between the stones...
The Marginalian
John Quincy Adams on Impostor Syndrome and the True Measure of Success
“You will never get any more out of life than you expect,” Bruce Lee wrote to himself. All...
7 months ago
“You will never get any more out of life than you expect,” Bruce Lee wrote to himself. All expectation is a story of the possible. Every person lives inside a story of who they are, what they are worth, and what is possible for their life, and suffers in proportion to how...
Josh Thompson
Waking Up Early, Part 3
I’ve written about my attempts to
wake up early before.
Most recently, I
promised to take a sleep...
over a year ago
I’ve written about my attempts to
wake up early before.
Most recently, I
promised to take a sleep log, to track trends. Fortunately, I did not intend to try to wake up early, because I didn’t.
Here’s what I learned in the last three weeks:
Benadryl messes with your ability to...
Anecdotal Evidence
'But There Must Have Been More'
One of the unexpected
gifts of being young and working as a newspaper reporter was the...
a year ago
One of the unexpected
gifts of being young and working as a newspaper reporter was the giddy
sensation of being thrown into life and finally mistaken for an adult. Some of
the one-time abstractions – murder, suicide, cancer – become real. Once you’ve
interviewed the parents of a...
Escaping Flatland
The third chair
I remembered my loneliness; I felt it with a defencelessness that I had denied myself at the time....
10 months ago
I remembered my loneliness; I felt it with a defencelessness that I had denied myself at the time. The feeling that writing was impossible; that I would never find a place in the world that felt like home; that no one except my wife would ever care about me, about the things that...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Companionable Room'
I had a
minor problem with the university library’s catalog. When I requested two books
stored...
a year ago
I had a
minor problem with the university library’s catalog. When I requested two books
stored off-site in the Library Service Center I got this message: “No items can
fulfill the submitted request.” That made no sense and I couldn’t figure out a
way around the roadblock, so I...
The Elysian
Writing Prompt: Fix Capitalism
By September 30th.
4 months ago
Anecdotal Evidence
'Implacable, Bewildered, It Moves Among Us'
Some sixteen
years ago David Ferry thanked me for a post I had written about some of the lines by...
a year ago
Some sixteen
years ago David Ferry thanked me for a post I had written about some of the lines by Dr. Johnson interpolated into his poems. That email is long gone but
I remember being touched by his buoyant sense of gratitude. That a man in his
eighties, much honored as a poet,...
Anecdotal Evidence
'His Own Exclusive Object'
I’ve
accumulated some of the accoutrements of age – bifocals, cane, hearing aids.
None embarrasses...
5 months ago
I’ve
accumulated some of the accoutrements of age – bifocals, cane, hearing aids.
None embarrasses me and all make life less annoying. I’ve never been seriously
ill. I take my handful of vitamins and meds in the morning. I no longer drink
and never smoked. Among the last things I...
The American Scholar
Ups and Downs
The post Ups and Downs appeared first on The American Scholar.
a month ago
The post Ups and Downs appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'To Build a House for Fools and Mad'
An entry dated
June 15, 1830 in Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Table
Talk: “[Jonathan, not Taylor]...
7 months ago
An entry dated
June 15, 1830 in Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Table
Talk: “[Jonathan, not Taylor] Swift
was anima Rabelaisii habitans in sicco,--the
soul of Rabelais dwelling in a dry place. Yet Swift was rare.”
Now there’s a
metaphor that sticks in the mind – “dwelling in a dry...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Scrawls With a Lavish Hand Its Signature'
“Where the wind listeth, there the sailboats list, / Water is
touched with a light case of hives /...
3 months ago
“Where the wind listeth, there the sailboats list, / Water is
touched with a light case of hives / Or wandering gooseflesh.”
Carl George is the sort of scientist whose company I most enjoy. He is a generalist, what
used to be called a naturalist. Now an emeritus professor of...
Wuthering...
Metamorphoses, Books XI to XV - The whole of it flows
I had better finish up Ovid’s Metamorphoses before I
forget what was in it. It is full of
memorable...
9 months ago
I had better finish up Ovid’s Metamorphoses before I
forget what was in it. It is full of
memorable things, but I have limits.
Books XI through XV, the last five, in this post.
Book X ended with the songs of Orpheus, so he has to begin
Book XI with Orpheus’s gruesome death,...
The Marginalian
Enchantment and the Courage of Joy: René Magritte on the Antidote to the Banality of Pessimism
"Life is wasted when we make it more terrifying, precisely because it is so easy to do so."
a year ago
"Life is wasted when we make it more terrifying, precisely because it is so easy to do so."
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Pageboy — The world’s simplest static site generator.
Pageboy is a tiny app that lives in your Mac’s menu bar and helps you make static websites a bit...
a month ago
Pageboy is a tiny app that lives in your Mac’s menu bar and helps you make static websites a bit more easily. Use the good ol’ HTML, CSS, and JS you already know to build your headers, footers, and partials — then bring it together with a simple tag and instantly see the output....
Anecdotal Evidence
'You Have to Read the Words'
“Tolstoy was
so much better than any other writer who ever lived that you couldn’t even
remotely...
3 months ago
“Tolstoy was
so much better than any other writer who ever lived that you couldn’t even
remotely compare anyone to him.”
I first read
War and Peace in the eighth grade in
a paperback abridgement. I remember reading it in science class, half-heartedly
hiding the book behind the...
Ben Borgers
I want to use all of my ridiculously many meal swipes
over a year ago
Josh Thompson
Bollards: Why & What
author’s note: it’s always fun to see your own stuff on the Hacker News front page! This very post...
8 months ago
author’s note: it’s always fun to see your own stuff on the Hacker News front page! This very post sparked >450 comments worth of conversation! I didn’t even know this got posted until days later!
What are bollards
The what and the why in a single image:
The what and why in a...
ribbonfarm
History is More Like Science Fiction Than Fantasy
I’ve been slow-reading Bettany Hughes’ Istanbul: A Tale of Three Cities for months now, ever since I...
9 months ago
I’ve been slow-reading Bettany Hughes’ Istanbul: A Tale of Three Cities for months now, ever since I visited the city (on Kindle, so I didn’t realize when I started that it’s 600 pages plus another 250 odd notes). It’s dense and absorbing and I’ll probably do a reflections post...
The American Scholar
Others
Too many people in the world isn’t the problem—people are the problem
The post Others appeared first...
4 months ago
Too many people in the world isn’t the problem—people are the problem
The post Others appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'Tomorrow I Propose to Regulate My Room'
A reader in Columbus,
Ohio reports a “Samuel Johnson sighting in Ogden Nash.” In the December...
a month ago
A reader in Columbus,
Ohio reports a “Samuel Johnson sighting in Ogden Nash.” In the December 21,
1968 issue of The New Yorker he found
the poem “Is There a Dr. Johnson in the House.” It’s a typical irregularly lined,
jokily rhymed production by Nash that begins:
“Do you...
Josh Thompson
Make Hard Things Easier by Removing Friction
Friction resists movement.
Lots of things count as (negative) friction.
Anything that consumes...
over a year ago
Friction resists movement.
Lots of things count as (negative) friction.
Anything that consumes resources (time, energy, money, physical goods.)
Anything that causes negative feelings (shame, doubt, guilt, fear.)
Anything that could have a downside (losing money, respect, your...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Otherwise, as Apolitical as Possible"
“If Ralph
Nader is for it, I am against it; otherwise, as apolitical as possible.”
That sort...
10 months ago
“If Ralph
Nader is for it, I am against it; otherwise, as apolitical as possible.”
That sort of
common sense becomes as rare as humility by the hour. It’s the time of year
when we start filling the recycling bin with unsolicited, unread campaign literature. This
season’s favored...
Escaping Flatland
Authenticity as dialogue
John Stuart Mill, notetaking, rationality, and emotion
a month ago
John Stuart Mill, notetaking, rationality, and emotion
sbensu
Lieutenants are the limiting reagent
Why don't software companies ship more products? Why do they move more slowly as they grow? What do...
a year ago
Why don't software companies ship more products? Why do they move more slowly as they grow? What do we mean when we say "this company lacks focus"?
The American Scholar
Changing the Lens
Exploding the Canon, Episode 5 (Finale)
The post Changing the Lens appeared first on The American...
8 months ago
Exploding the Canon, Episode 5 (Finale)
The post Changing the Lens appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'He Actually Read the Dictionary'
In one of
the news weeklies long ago I read that Dr. Oliver Sacks enjoyed reading the Oxford English...
a year ago
In one of
the news weeklies long ago I read that Dr. Oliver Sacks enjoyed reading the Oxford English Dictionary. Was this mere
bravado, another instance of Sacks polishing his image as a lovable, learned
eccentric? Or, like his friend W.H. Auden, was he gleaning the dictionary...
Josh Thompson
Talent is Overrated
Talent is Overrated
In Talent is Overrated, the author argues that world-class performers are not...
over a year ago
Talent is Overrated
In Talent is Overrated, the author argues that world-class performers are not genetically gifted. The difference between world-class performers and the rest of us? Lots of deliberate practice. (Read the article.)
I have no interest in becoming Mozart, or Tiger...
This Space
39 Books: 2000
In 1998 my friend John Harris mentioned that he was travelling to the US so I asked if he could pick...
8 months ago
In 1998 my friend John Harris mentioned that he was travelling to the US so I asked if he could pick up a copy of the new translation of Peter Handke's My Year in the No-man's Bay, not available over here. He was the first to tell me about this new website called Amazon. This is...
Anecdotal Evidence
'But, Take It From This Famous Pote [sic]'
Isaac
Waisberg of IWP Books has published his latest anthology of Horace translations,
this time a...
11 months ago
Isaac
Waisberg of IWP Books has published his latest anthology of Horace translations,
this time a generous 417 versions of Ode I.5, the “Ode to Pyrrha,” dating from 1621 to 2007. The one I’m familiar with is John Milton’s, described
by the poet as “rendered almost word for word...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Poets Who Are Plain and Gladsome'
Being or
pretending to be a philistine is great fun. It was one of Philip Larkin’s favorite
ruses...
10 months ago
Being or
pretending to be a philistine is great fun. It was one of Philip Larkin’s favorite
ruses (“Books are a load of crap”). It’s certain to rile the pompous and
pretentious, so all you have to do is sit back and enjoy the sputtering. I’ve
happened on a first-rate anthology of...
Anecdotal Evidence
'The Moment Before the Germans Will Arrive'
A Jewish
friend writes: “The distraction of the war and its repercussions around the
world is making...
a year ago
A Jewish
friend writes: “The distraction of the war and its repercussions around the
world is making concentration on other things difficult. . . . I wish I could tune the news out. But
the stakes for the future of Israel and of Jewish life generally are too great
for me to be...
Anecdotal Evidence
'A Line or Two Worth Keeping All Too Rare'
“He has
never been much of a poet for opening magic casements -- ordinary dirty storm
windows,...
a year ago
“He has
never been much of a poet for opening magic casements -- ordinary dirty storm
windows, rather.”
That’s X.J. Kennedy on Kingsley Amis, clearly seeing his own reflection in that dirty
window. Both are proof that the best writers of light verse or comic poetry are
serious...
Anecdotal Evidence
'This Refined, White-Sheeted Torture'
My tutelary
spirit of recent days has been the American poet L.E. Sissman, dead from
Hodgkin...
5 months ago
My tutelary
spirit of recent days has been the American poet L.E. Sissman, dead from
Hodgkin lymphoma at age forty-eight. Out in the hall I spoke with three
oncologists after they had yet again examined
my brother. I asked the question no one had yet asked: How much time does...
The American Scholar
Reborn in the City of Light
At a time when Paris was an incubator of modernism, a group of bold American women arrived to make...
4 months ago
At a time when Paris was an incubator of modernism, a group of bold American women arrived to make art out of their lives
The post Reborn in the City of Light appeared first on The American Scholar.
Josh Thompson
Letter to Two Climbers (Part 2)
Hello again, it’s me! We met climbing a few days ago.
I wrote you a letter, but didn’t want to leave...
over a year ago
Hello again, it’s me! We met climbing a few days ago.
I wrote you a letter, but didn’t want to leave it on such a pessimistic note.
First, I commend you both for getting out there. You both invested a lot in making that weekend happen. You acquired the correct tools, and spent...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Not At All Abashed Before the Fact'
“We do not
go to cowards for tender dealing; there is nothing so cruel as panic; the man
who has...
a year ago
“We do not
go to cowards for tender dealing; there is nothing so cruel as panic; the man
who has least fear for his own carcass, has most time to consider others.”
What a
remarkable sentence, one I would never have the guts to write. It’s not the
sentiment but the form that’s so...
Josh Thompson
What Do You Do?
I enjoy meeting new people. Usually, one of the first questions I’ll ask them is “What to you...
over a year ago
I enjoy meeting new people. Usually, one of the first questions I’ll ask them is “What to you do?”
They usually respond with their occupation, or their status in school. My follow-up question is “When you’re not doing that, what do you do?”
Sometimes this is a conversational...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Living Through Radical Change'
Ten years
ago, Joseph Epstein wrote to his friend Frederic Raphael:
“I have
myself long ago put...
9 months ago
Ten years
ago, Joseph Epstein wrote to his friend Frederic Raphael:
“I have
myself long ago put aside any thought about writing an autobiography. . . .
When I became, almost without conscious decision, a bookish and a scribbling
man, the larger sense of adventure went out of my...
Anecdotal Evidence
'The Essence of Good Talk'
A longtime reader
of this blog stopped by the house on Saturday, we talked and the...
a year ago
A longtime reader
of this blog stopped by the house on Saturday, we talked and the afternoon
evaporated. Neither of us brought a script. “Improvisation is the essence of
good talk,” writes Max Beerbohm in “Lytton Strachey” (1943). “Heaven defend us
from the talker who doles out...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Dookie Demastered
THE LANDMARK 1994 ALBUM. 15 TRACKS DEMASTERED IN 15 FORMATS. THE WAY IT WAS NEVER MEANT TO BE...
3 months ago
THE LANDMARK 1994 ALBUM. 15 TRACKS DEMASTERED IN 15 FORMATS. THE WAY IT WAS NEVER MEANT TO BE HEARD.
These are all brilliant. I'm partial to the wax cylinder version of When I Come Around, my favorite track from Dookie.
Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
Astral Codex Ten
Highlights From The Comments On Lynn And IQ
...
3 days ago
The Marginalian
Sheltering the Heroes Among Us: John Berger on Art as Resistance and Redemption of Justice
"The powerful fear art, whatever its form... because it makes sense of what life’s brutalities...
2 months ago
"The powerful fear art, whatever its form... because it makes sense of what life’s brutalities cannot, a sense that unites us... becomes a meeting-place of the invisible, the irreducible, the enduring."
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Travel Is No Cure for the Mind
Who we are inside a venue matters far more than the venue itself. Instead of having the wanderlust...
2 weeks ago
Who we are inside a venue matters far more than the venue itself. Instead of having the wanderlust of travel guide our search for meaning, we have to look within and embrace the only thing that is present now. The only thing that actually exists today.
— Lawrence Yeo
I do love...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Chonk
A heavy display sans that likes to take up space.
— Jason Santa Maria
Visit original link → or View...
10 months ago
A heavy display sans that likes to take up space.
— Jason Santa Maria
Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
Josh Thompson
On Minimalism
I reluctantly call myself a minimalist. I’d prefer to call myself an “enoughalist”.
This reluctance...
over a year ago
I reluctantly call myself a minimalist. I’d prefer to call myself an “enoughalist”.
This reluctance is because I think the label brings in a bunch of connotations that I don’t like.
Our apartment never looked like this. Source: home-designing.com
What is Minimalism?
a removal or...
The Marginalian
Alone Together: An Illustrated Celebration of the Art of Shared Solitude
“One can never be alone enough to write,” Susan Sontag lamented in her diary. “Oh comforting...
a year ago
“One can never be alone enough to write,” Susan Sontag lamented in her diary. “Oh comforting solitude, how favorable thou art to original thought!” the founding father of neuroscience exulted in considering the ideal environment for creative breakthrough. All creative people,...
The American Scholar
The Patron Subjects
Who were the Wertheimers, the family that sat for a dozen of John Singer Sargent’s paintings?
The...
2 months ago
Who were the Wertheimers, the family that sat for a dozen of John Singer Sargent’s paintings?
The post The Patron Subjects appeared first on The American Scholar.
Josh Thompson
Trader Joe's Parking Lot
Hey Trader Joe’s,
This is a bit of an open letter, inspired by a recent visit to the local Trader...
a year ago
Hey Trader Joe’s,
This is a bit of an open letter, inspired by a recent visit to the local Trader Joe’s. I just moved to this part of Denver, and now for the first time am living within like a 3 minute scoot of a Trader Joe’s.
I know that some people like to complain about...
Anecdotal Evidence
'To Consider Seriously My Condition'
Soon after
he is shipwrecked on an island off the coast of Venezuela and has finished...
a year ago
Soon after
he is shipwrecked on an island off the coast of Venezuela and has finished salvaging
everything useful from the wreckage, Robinson Crusoe builds a calendar:
“After I had
been there about ten or twelve days, it came into my thoughts that I should
lose my reckoning of...
Journal and Links by...
✏️ The New Design
A few times a week, we get emails from students and young designers looking for an internship or...
over a year ago
A few times a week, we get emails from students and young designers looking for an internship or full-time opportunities at the studio. We’re not quite ready in terms of needing outside help, so these are unsolicited inquiries. We don’t make any mention of not accepting them as...
The Marginalian
The Humanistic Philosopher and Psychologist Erich Fromm on Love and the Meaning of Respect
"Care and responsibility are constituent elements of love, but without respect for and knowledge of...
6 months ago
"Care and responsibility are constituent elements of love, but without respect for and knowledge of the beloved person, love deteriorates into domination and possessiveness."
The American Scholar
Good Intentions
The post Good Intentions appeared first on The American Scholar.
3 months ago
The post Good Intentions appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'Punners and Rhymers Must Have the Last Word'
“I cannot
but think that we live in a bad age, / O
tempora, O mores! as ’tis in the adage.”
The...
4 months ago
“I cannot
but think that we live in a bad age, / O
tempora, O mores! as ’tis in the adage.”
The Latin
tag is proverbial, deriving from Cicero’s Catiline orations: “O times, O manners!”
It’s the template for all lamentations. Jonathan Swift is repeating it in the
opening lines of...
Astral Codex Ten
The Innocent And The Beautiful Have No Enemy But Time
...
a month ago
Josh Thompson
How to Ask Questions of Experts To Gain More than Just Answers
Recently, I co-led a session at Turing with Regis Boudinot, a Turing grad who works at GitLab.
We...
over a year ago
Recently, I co-led a session at Turing with Regis Boudinot, a Turing grad who works at GitLab.
We discussed two things:
asking good questions
having a good workflow
After the session, I promised an overview of what we discussed. Here’s that overview for “Asking good questions”....
The American Scholar
“Planetarium” by Adrienne Rich
Poems read aloud, beautifully
The post “Planetarium” by Adrienne Rich appeared first on The American...
8 months ago
Poems read aloud, beautifully
The post “Planetarium” by Adrienne Rich appeared first on The American Scholar.
The Marginalian
The Poetry of Reality: Robert Louis Stevenson on What Makes Life Worth Living
"The true realism, always and everywhere, is that of the poets: to find out where joy resides, and...
a year ago
"The true realism, always and everywhere, is that of the poets: to find out where joy resides, and give it a voice far beyond singing."
The American Scholar
The Importance of Being Different
A travel writer’s education
The post The Importance of Being Different appeared first on The...
8 months ago
A travel writer’s education
The post The Importance of Being Different appeared first on The American Scholar.
Escaping Flatland
Integrity
Intensely Human, No 3
11 months ago
The Marginalian
The Lost Drop: An Illustrated Celebration of the Wonder of the Water Cycle and the Interconnected...
I remember when I first learned about the water cycle, about how it makes of our planet a living...
a year ago
I remember when I first learned about the water cycle, about how it makes of our planet a living world and binds the fate of every molecule to that of every other. I remember feeling in my child-bones the profound interconnectedness of life as I realized I was breathing the...
The American Scholar
“How Happy Is the Little Stone” by Emily Dickinson
Poems read aloud, beautifully
The post “How Happy Is the Little Stone” by Emily Dickinson appeared...
8 months ago
Poems read aloud, beautifully
The post “How Happy Is the Little Stone” by Emily Dickinson appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'With All Its Philistinism and Coarseness'
My roommate freshman year was
the son of a Slovak father and an Austrian mother who had emigrated to...
2 months ago
My roommate freshman year was
the son of a Slovak father and an Austrian mother who had emigrated to the U.S.
after World War II. Mike was trilingual from birth, without an accent unless it
was a Cleveland accent that I couldn’t hear because it was mine as well. His
tastes often...
Josh Thompson
RailsConf Presentation: 'Junior' Developers are a Solution to Many of your Problems
Did this talk resonate and you want to implement some of the ideas at your company? I might be able...
over a year ago
Did this talk resonate and you want to implement some of the ideas at your company? I might be able to help. Shoot me an email at joshthompson@hey.com or book some time to talk at https://calendly.com/joshthompson/coffee.
This talk is available on railsconf.org, here:...
Anecdotal Evidence
'A Brief, Dry, Almost Colorless Account '
The Polish
writer Gustaw Herling-Grudziński (1919-2000) --
Gulag survivor, co-founder of Kultura
and...
a year ago
The Polish
writer Gustaw Herling-Grudziński (1919-2000) --
Gulag survivor, co-founder of Kultura
and author of A World Apart: Imprisonment
in a Soviet Labor Camp During World War II (1951) – has sent me back to
Varlam Shalamov and his Kolyma stories. Herling-Grudziński in 1971...
The Marginalian
Some Thoughts about the Ocean and the Universe
How to bear the gravity of being.
a year ago
How to bear the gravity of being.
The Marginalian
The Life of Trees: A Poem
"I want to sleep and dream the life of trees, beings from the muted world..."
a year ago
"I want to sleep and dream the life of trees, beings from the muted world..."
Josh Thompson
Elixir/Phoenix part deux
I planned on working through this tutorial for building a slack clone, but half-way through the...
over a year ago
I planned on working through this tutorial for building a slack clone, but half-way through the set-up instructions, after I installed Elixir and Phoenix, I took a long detour through the basic set-up guide. Built some custom routes, along with controllers/views/templates,...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Accumulated instinct
With age and experience, I’ve accumulated enough inspiration to trust my instincts. There’s a...
2 weeks ago
With age and experience, I’ve accumulated enough inspiration to trust my instincts. There’s a confidence that when the moment arrives, I’ll recall that inspiring visual with just enough detail to fuel my decision-making or creative process.
— Simon Collison
Simon and I have...
The American Scholar
“The Purse-Seine” by Robinson Jeffers
Poems read aloud, beautifully
The post “The Purse-Seine” by Robinson Jeffers appeared first on The...
5 days ago
Poems read aloud, beautifully
The post “The Purse-Seine” by Robinson Jeffers appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'They Require No Mortar'
“He is one of those
writers for whom, if you care at all, you care immensely.”
This reader started...
3 days ago
“He is one of those
writers for whom, if you care at all, you care immensely.”
This reader started in
puberty as a serial monogamist, wedded briefly but intensely to Edgar Rice
Burroughs, and turned in time into a guiltless polygamist. In junior-high
school, sick at home with...
The American Scholar
The Challenge
The post The Challenge appeared first on The American Scholar.
5 months ago
The post The Challenge appeared first on The American Scholar.
Josh Thompson
MacOS: Keyboard Shortcut to Toggle Bookmarks Bar in Firefox
A few weeks ago, after Firefox Quantum came out, I decided to try making Firefox my daily browser,...
over a year ago
A few weeks ago, after Firefox Quantum came out, I decided to try making Firefox my daily browser, instead of Chrome.
Turns out, Firefox is great! It was a near-seamless transition, and Firefox has a much lower memory footprint, as well as features Chrome does not have, like...
The Marginalian
Stunning Century-Old Illustrations of Tibetan Fairy Tales from the Artist Who Created Bambi
Soulful art from stories that speak "to the childhood of all times and all races."
a year ago
Soulful art from stories that speak "to the childhood of all times and all races."
Anecdotal Evidence
'Nothing Given Us to Keep Is Lost'
Howard Nemerov
reminded me not of Walden Pond in Concord but of a smaller, less storied pond at
the...
7 months ago
Howard Nemerov
reminded me not of Walden Pond in Concord but of a smaller, less storied pond at
the opposite end of Massachusetts, near Lee in the Berkshires. I was there to
interview Paul Metcalf (1917-99) and his wife Nancy for my newspaper in the
summer of 1988. Paul was a...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Substack is at it again
There is no such thing as a perfect place on the internet. But it’s possible to avoid the ones that...
2 weeks ago
There is no such thing as a perfect place on the internet. But it’s possible to avoid the ones that aren’t even pretending to try to be better. The best time to leave Substack was a long time ago. The second best time is now.
— Marisa Kabas
Visit original link → or View on...
Ben Borgers
The Code That Keeps Me Alive
over a year ago
Josh Thompson
Why schedule something that doesn't exist?
The first thing I did when making this post is I set it to be published tomorrow.
Then, I left the...
over a year ago
The first thing I did when making this post is I set it to be published tomorrow.
Then, I left the room for a bit. I didn’t have anything to say. Or, I didn’t think I did.
Yet, all over my computer, and in various list trackers and note-taking apps, I’ve got dozens of ideas to...
Wuthering...
Books I Read in May 2023
I had a good time.
GREEK PHILOSOPHY
The Nicomachean Ethics (4th C. BCE), Aristotle - a post,...
a year ago
I had a good time.
GREEK PHILOSOPHY
The Nicomachean Ethics (4th C. BCE), Aristotle - a post, however shallow, should appear soon.
FICTION
Joseph in Egypt (1936), Thomas Mann
The Long Valley (1938)
&
The Grapes of Wrath (1939), John Steinbeck - I last read this probably...
This Space
Books of the year 2024
In order of being read.
Giorgio Agamben – What I saw, heard, learned…
One night, along Venice’s...
a month ago
In order of being read.
Giorgio Agamben – What I saw, heard, learned…
One night, along Venice’s Zattere, watching the putrid water lap at the city’s foundations, I saw that we exist solely in the intermittence of our being, and that what we call I is just a shadow...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Rivian — Pentagram
A custom typeface for the American electric vehicle manufacturer reflects its spirit of innovation...
2 months ago
A custom typeface for the American electric vehicle manufacturer reflects its spirit of innovation and adventure.
Söhne is the typeface du jour of late (Stripe, OpenAI/ChatGPT, Rivian prior to this, and even this very website), and its nice to see Pentagram evolve it in...
Josh Thompson
On Friction
warning. self-indulgeant diatribe coming. I generally try to avoid these, but it’s my website, and I...
over a year ago
warning. self-indulgeant diatribe coming. I generally try to avoid these, but it’s my website, and I can write what I want.
We’re rapidly approaching the end of the year, and I’ve got a few dozen ideas rolling around my head that I want to solidify my thoughts on.
One of the...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Site Nonsite: Live at Delia's Third Happening
Months of work went into this show, resulting in six fresh arrangements and two new songs, and I was...
4 months ago
Months of work went into this show, resulting in six fresh arrangements and two new songs, and I was unexpectedly happy with everything captured on the night. This document feels like a fitting conclusion to the first chapter of Site Nonsite.
— Simon Collison
A real treat for the...
Ben Borgers
Are My Technical Posts Worth It?
over a year ago
The American Scholar
To Catch a Sunset
Reflections on allergies, anxieties, and the limits of familial love
The post To Catch a Sunset...
6 months ago
Reflections on allergies, anxieties, and the limits of familial love
The post To Catch a Sunset appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'I Like to Think of Pasteur in Elysium'
In 1985, the
year Mikhail Gorbachev was elected General Secretary by the Politburo, the scholar
and...
8 months ago
In 1985, the
year Mikhail Gorbachev was elected General Secretary by the Politburo, the scholar
and translator Clarence Brown published The
Portable Twentieth-Century Russian Reader, a selection ranging from Tolstoy
and Chekhov to Voinovich and Sokolov. In the introduction he...
Josh Thompson
Mocks & Stubs & Exceptions in Ruby
Some of my recent work has been around improving error handling and logging.
We had some tasks that,...
over a year ago
Some of my recent work has been around improving error handling and logging.
We had some tasks that, if they failed to execute correctly, were supposed to raise exceptions, log themselves, and re-queue, but they were not.
The class in which I was working managed in large part API...
Steven Scrawls
The Firefly Artist
The Firefly Artist
Note: it’s a metaphor. I’m not calling for mass firefly
imprisonment.
Two hours...
a year ago
The Firefly Artist
Note: it’s a metaphor. I’m not calling for mass firefly
imprisonment.
Two hours after dusk, a crowd gathered by the dozens, by the
hundreds, to see the firefly artist’s yearly performance. They spread
out blankets in the clearing, sharing snacks by the light of...
The Elysian
Week 5: Write one (pitchable) think piece
9 months ago
This Space
"A mighty, contagious absence"
The number of obituaries, tributes, backhanded compliments and overt smears in the corporate news...
10 months ago
The number of obituaries, tributes, backhanded compliments and overt smears in the corporate news media following the death of John Pilger reveal the state of journalism in our time. [1] Can you name one living Anglophone journalist whose loss would prompt such widespread notice?...
Anecdotal Evidence
'And Hears of Life's Intent'
“. . . I’ve had it. No more pronouncements on lousy
verse. No more hidden competition. No
more...
a year ago
“. . . I’ve had it. No more pronouncements on lousy
verse. No more hidden competition. No
more struggling not to be square.
Etc.”
Louise Bogan
is writing to her friend Ruth Limmer on October 1, 1969, announcing her
retirement as poetry reviewer from The
New Yorker after...
The American Scholar
Tunneling to Freedom
In The Great Escape (1963), the true story of a harrowing breakout from a German POW camp
The post...
7 months ago
In The Great Escape (1963), the true story of a harrowing breakout from a German POW camp
The post Tunneling to Freedom appeared first on The American Scholar.
Wuthering...
The sophists and their rehabilitation - they clearly cause the ruin and corruption of their...
I have been pursuing the sophists, the great antagonists of Socrates and Plato. Minimized for...
a year ago
I have been pursuing the sophists, the great antagonists of Socrates and Plato. Minimized for centuries in the history of philosophy as, following Plato (but not Socrates), hucksters, they, or some of them, are now taken seriously as an intermediate step between the cosmological...
The Marginalian
Yes: William Stafford’s Poetic Calibration of Perspective
"No guarantees in this life."
12 months ago
"No guarantees in this life."
Josh Thompson
Climbing in Cuba, 2019
A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to go climbing in Cuba.
Mark and Dave, walking back from...
over a year ago
A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to go climbing in Cuba.
Mark and Dave, walking back from climbing outside Viñales
Locals crag, called “The roof of the world”. Stunning routes.
because it was so hot, we spent a lot of time in this cave.
Kristi and I tend to stick...
Ben Borgers
There’s No Personal Space in College
over a year ago
Escaping Flatland
Things I learned working with artists
As I said in “Lessons I learned working at an art gallery,” I had several observations that I...
a month ago
As I said in “Lessons I learned working at an art gallery,” I had several observations that I couldn’t fit into that post—so lets continue today.
Ben Borgers
Class Council: “Brutally Honest”
over a year ago
Anecdotal Evidence
'An Impetuous Eagerness to Subvert'
Dr. Johnson describes
the poet and physician Mark Akenside: “He
certainly retained an unnecessary...
7 months ago
Dr. Johnson describes
the poet and physician Mark Akenside: “He
certainly retained an unnecessary and outrageous zeal for what he called and
thought liberty; a zeal which sometimes disguises from the world, and not
rarely from the mind which it possesses, an envious desire of...
The Elysian
I'm traveling the world to study utopia
An update about my life and artistic process.
7 months ago
An update about my life and artistic process.
This Space
39 Books: 2004
Bought for an eye-watering £13 in the LRB Bookshop three months before this blog began, Once Again...
8 months ago
Bought for an eye-watering £13 in the LRB Bookshop three months before this blog began, Once Again for Thucydides is another example in this series of how a book of under 100 pages can be worth as much as any number of maximalist breeze blocks.
But do I really want to make such...
The Marginalian
How to Have Enough: Wendell Berry on Creativity and Love
“Enough is so vast a sweetness, I suppose it never occurs, only pathetic counterfeits,” Emily...
a month ago
“Enough is so vast a sweetness, I suppose it never occurs, only pathetic counterfeits,” Emily Dickinson sighed in one of her love letters to Susan an epoch before Kurt Vonnegut, in a short and lovely poem, distilled happiness to the knowledge that you have enough. It is not an...
The Marginalian
The Promethean Power of Burnout
"Burnout fully realised is also the decisive, exhausted moment in which we realise we cannot go on...
2 weeks ago
"Burnout fully realised is also the decisive, exhausted moment in which we realise we cannot go on in the same way. Not being able to go on, is always in the end, a creative act, the threshold moment of our transformation."
The American Scholar
My Cousin Manya
One survivor’s story
The post My Cousin Manya appeared first on The American Scholar.
2 months ago
One survivor’s story
The post My Cousin Manya appeared first on The American Scholar.
The Marginalian
I Touched the Sun: A Tender Illustrated Parable About How to Find and Bear Your Inner Light
“One discovers the light in darkness, that is what darkness is for; but everything in our lives...
a year ago
“One discovers the light in darkness, that is what darkness is for; but everything in our lives depends on how we bear the light,” James Baldwin wrote in one of his finest, least known essays. In his exquisite memoir of the search for inner light, the blind resistance hero...
Josh Thompson
Context Setting for certain patterns & classes of relationship difficulties
I’ve been “catching up” a lot in my life lately. Some of that catching up involves bringing up to...
over a year ago
I’ve been “catching up” a lot in my life lately. Some of that catching up involves bringing up to speed various people I’ve not spoken too (or spoken too much, or openly, or recently, or ever, or some combination thereof).
I am strongly biased towards written/editable/consistent...
Josh Thompson
How To Procfile: Run Just a Single Process
Lets say you’ve got something like this in your Procfile:
web: PORT=3000...
over a year ago
Lets say you’ve got something like this in your Procfile:
web: PORT=3000 RAILS_ENV=development bundle exec puma -C ./config/puma_development.rb -e development
devlog: tail -f ./log/development.log
mailcatcher: ruby -rbundler/setup -e...
Anecdotal Evidence
'A Master Etcher of Human Portraits'
In
celebration of Edwin Arlington Robinson’s fiftieth birthday, on December 22,
1919, seventeen...
a year ago
In
celebration of Edwin Arlington Robinson’s fiftieth birthday, on December 22,
1919, seventeen poets and friends were asked to contribute to a symposium published
a day earlier in the New York Times Book
Review. All but Robert Frost contributed. Amy Lowell wrote: “A realist,...
Wuthering...
"Socrates gone mad" - my hero Diogenes the Cynic
He lived in a jar, owned a staff and a cloak and nothing
else, and was a sarcastic pain in the...
a year ago
He lived in a jar, owned a staff and a cloak and nothing
else, and was a sarcastic pain in the ass.
He took the example of Socrates to its limit. Plato is the one who called him “Socrates
gone mad,” but in a sense he is just the logical result of thinking through how
Socrates...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Art Is Wild As a Cat'
Nige tells me he attended
a reading at Cambridge given by Stevie Smith not long before her death in...
4 days ago
Nige tells me he attended
a reading at Cambridge given by Stevie Smith not long before her death in 1971.
“I remember [her],” he writes, “more for her extraordinary presence and her
eccentric, but very effective way of reading her work. . . . [A]t the time I
was a young...
The Marginalian
Home: An Illustrated Celebration of the Genius and Wonder of Animal Dwellings
“There’s no place like home,” Dorothy sighs in The Wizard of Oz. But home is not a place — it is a...
9 months ago
“There’s no place like home,” Dorothy sighs in The Wizard of Oz. But home is not a place — it is a locus of longing, always haunted by our existential homelessness. “Welcome home!” a cheaply suited broker once exclaimed at me, swinging open the door to a tiny studio as my foot...
Wuthering...
Stein's style - Mostly no one will be wanting to listen, I am certain
Not many find it interesting this way I am realizing every
one, not any I am just now hearing, and...
7 months ago
Not many find it interesting this way I am realizing every
one, not any I am just now hearing, and it is so completely an important thing,
it is a complete thing in understanding, I am going on writing, I am going on
now with a description of all whom Alfred Hersland came to know...
Anecdotal Evidence
'A Profoundly Bitter Lesson'
My friend
Moshe Vardi is a computer scientist at Rice University, the Karen Ostrum...
a year ago
My friend
Moshe Vardi is a computer scientist at Rice University, the Karen Ostrum George
Distinguished Service Professor in Computational Engineering. He has published
an essay, “A Moral Rot at Rice University”:
“I was well
aware that antisemitism is alive and well in the US,...
Wuthering...
Books I read in October 2024 - the old, care-free days of Wuthering Heights
I should do one of these “what I read” bits before October becomes
too distant.
I should also...
2 months ago
I should do one of these “what I read” bits before October becomes
too distant.
I should also mention my health. A little over a year ago a surgeon of genius
removed a cancerous tumor from my liver, taking much of my liver along with
it. My recovery went well, and my liver
grew...
Anecdotal Evidence
'The Poem Saves Time and Space'
Discovering
a good writer long after his death is a gift and a betrayal. Gratitude mingles
with...
7 months ago
Discovering
a good writer long after his death is a gift and a betrayal. Gratitude mingles
with regret and even guilt. Selfishly, we wish he had truly been our
contemporary and we had been smarter and watched him develop as a writer.
Instead, we compensate by scrambling after his...
Josh Thompson
Migrating my Jekyll site to Netlify
Troubleshooting Netilify deploy
Ugggh I moved intermediateruby.com to Netlify a few months ago in...
over a year ago
Troubleshooting Netilify deploy
Ugggh I moved intermediateruby.com to Netlify a few months ago in like 10 minutes, so my primary site, josh.works, should take maybe 20, right?
I’m a few hours deep. Here’s what I get when Netlify tries to build:
I should have done the following...
Josh Thompson
First five meals from The 4-Hour Chef
I don’t know how to cook. Period. My most impressive culinary creations were, until recently,...
over a year ago
I don’t know how to cook. Period. My most impressive culinary creations were, until recently, spaghetti and beans-n-rice.
I got married about a year ago, and had hoped that I would become inspired to become a world-class chef. After a long time eating Rice-A-Roni, spaghetti,...
The American Scholar
New Year, Old Year
The post New Year, Old Year appeared first on The American Scholar.
2 weeks ago
The post New Year, Old Year appeared first on The American Scholar.
The American Scholar
Above the River of Your Longing
Two new prompts
The post Above the River of Your Longing appeared first on The American Scholar.
3 days ago
Two new prompts
The post Above the River of Your Longing appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'We Are All Potential Recruits for Anarchy'
It’s an
honor to be published in The New
Criterion, a journal I started reading in 1986, four years...
7 months ago
It’s an
honor to be published in The New
Criterion, a journal I started reading in 1986, four years after it was
founded by the late Hilton Kramer and Samuel Lipman. To share pages in the June issue with Gary Saul Morson, Victor Davis Hanson and other gifted writers is...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Our Instinctual Taste for Periodicity and Return'
I got a kick
out of Damian at A Sunday of Liberty reveling in a rhyme that seems...
a year ago
I got a kick
out of Damian at A Sunday of Liberty reveling in a rhyme that seems genetically
implanted in American kids, regardless of age or geography:
“Greasy,
grimy gopher guts!
Little dirty
birdie feet!”
As in any
folk tradition, variants abound. This is the version I grew...
This Space
The Opposite Direction, a book
Please use a link below to download an ebook of posts selected from over the last seven years of...
over a year ago
Please use a link below to download an ebook of posts selected from over the last seven years of this blog.
This is the second collection after This Space of Writing and the title comes from the adolescent Thomas Bernhard's phrase repeated to an official at the labour exchange...
Journal and Links by...
✏️ Competency vs. Mastery
Another Zoom call ended. As is common, a few attendees would unmute themselves to speak temporarily....
a month ago
Another Zoom call ended. As is common, a few attendees would unmute themselves to speak temporarily. I noticed when people knew the unmute keyboard shortcut. Despite using the software for years now, it had eluded me (spacebar!). This was partly because I forgot to look it up...
The Marginalian
How We Render Reality: Attention as an Instrument of Love
"Since our consciousness plays some part in what comes into being, the play of attention can both...
a year ago
"Since our consciousness plays some part in what comes into being, the play of attention can both create and destroy, but it never leaves its object unchanged."
Anecdotal Evidence
'A Life That Is More Real Than Life'
My nephew and I were
talking about our teenage efforts to be “cool,” wearing irony like...
a week ago
My nephew and I were
talking about our teenage efforts to be “cool,” wearing irony like Kevlar,
feigning sophistication while avoiding the shock of experience. Some of us
outgrow it and become open to life’s surprises. Others carry the stance latently
for life, like the...
Josh Thompson
`Medusa` mythical creature: part 2
Preparing for Turing Series Index
What follows is an eight-part series that will help you pick up...
over a year ago
Preparing for Turing Series Index
What follows is an eight-part series that will help you pick up useful information about a number of topics related to Ruby, specifically geared for students learning the Ruby programming language, as part of the Turing School’s Backend Software...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Soothe the Soul and Nurture the Imagination'
“Among the
lessons we’ve learned during these past few difficult years of pandemic,
climate crisis...
a year ago
“Among the
lessons we’ve learned during these past few difficult years of pandemic,
climate crisis and political discord is that beauty and nature matter more than
ever, and that if our homes are to be sanctuaries from an often harsh outside
world, then we should fill them with...
Anecdotal Evidence
‘A Pocket Universe’
We lost power again around noon Saturday. No idea when it will be restored. Here is “The Next Book,”...
8 months ago
We lost power again around noon Saturday. No idea when it will be restored. Here is “The Next Book,” a 1969 poem by James Hayford (Star in the Shed Window: Collected Poems 1933-1988, New England Press, 1989):
“May the next book you read
Be what you need—
“A pocket...
Wuthering...
Books I read in November 2023
Recovery from surgery leads to a long list of books.
(Everything is going well, by the way,...
a year ago
Recovery from surgery leads to a long list of books.
(Everything is going well, by the way, thanks).
My idea of a “comfort read” is a book on a subject about which I do not
know much – start me over at the beginning – thus my enthusiastic Indian
literature project, which is...
Josh Thompson
Feedback pt. 2
Traditional Feedback is Explicit
Feedback is the means by which any system makes changes. From the...
over a year ago
Traditional Feedback is Explicit
Feedback is the means by which any system makes changes. From the gene pool to the swimming pool, feedback works to eliminate the insufficient and improve the sufficient. (See what I did with the “pool” thing?)
Your car gives you feedback if the...
sbensu
Semantic gaps
Swedish has a specific word for each of the four grandparents: mormor, morfar, farmor, farfar....
a year ago
Swedish has a specific word for each of the four grandparents: mormor, morfar, farmor, farfar. English doesn’t. So when you mention your 'grandma' to a Swede, they are left wondering 'which grandma?' even if it is not relevant to the story. That is a semantic gap.
The Marginalian
Favorite Books of 2023
To look back on a year of reading is to be handed a clear mirror of your priorities and passions, of...
a year ago
To look back on a year of reading is to be handed a clear mirror of your priorities and passions, of the questions that live in you and the reckonings that keep you up at night. While the literature of the present comprises only a tiny fraction of my own reading, here are a...
Wuthering...
Diogenes Laertius and the fun of the fragment
We have the complete Plato, from multiple manuscript sources. We have lost every published book...
over a year ago
We have the complete Plato, from multiple manuscript sources. We have lost every published book (widely copied scroll) of Aristotle’s, but a large mass of what are perhaps transcribed lecture notes survived, barely, in a single manuscript, so that is our Aristotle. I don’t know...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 LOW←TECH MAGAZINE
This is a solar-powered website, which means it sometimes goes offline.
In the same vein as the...
3 months ago
This is a solar-powered website, which means it sometimes goes offline.
In the same vein as the aforementioned link (Hundred Rabbits), this online magazine (also available offline) is powered by solar. There's a beauty in committing to sustainable methods of your online footprint...
Anecdotal Evidence
'He Knows to Get a Dollar'
The word tummler I learned from A.J. Liebling. It’s
the title of a story he collected in his first...
10 months ago
The word tummler I learned from A.J. Liebling. It’s
the title of a story he collected in his first book, Back Where I Came From (1938). “Tummler” was published in the
February 26, 1938 issue of The New Yorker
and begins:
“To the boys
of the I.&Y., Hymie Katz is a hero. He is a...
Josh Thompson
POODR Notes: Acquiring Behavior Through Inheritance (Chapter 6)
I’m reading through Practical Object Oriented Design in Ruby .
These are some notes from chapter 6,...
over a year ago
I’m reading through Practical Object Oriented Design in Ruby .
These are some notes from chapter 6, Acquiring Behavior Through Inheritance; mostly these are for me, and they don’t intend to stand on their own. Read the book, work through chapter six, and then come back and read...
The Marginalian
There Was a Shadow: A Lyrical Illustrated Celebration of the Changing Light, in the World and in the...
“Were it not for shadows, there would be no beauty,” Junichiro Tanizaki wrote in the 1933 Japanese...
6 months ago
“Were it not for shadows, there would be no beauty,” Junichiro Tanizaki wrote in the 1933 Japanese classic In Praise of Shadows. As a physical phenomenon, shadows are one of the most beguiling phenomena of nature, emissaries of the entwined history of light and consciousness; as...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Although Too Many Readers Have Forgotten'
My education
continues. Here is “Artillery” (Hazards,
1930) by the English poet Wilfrid Wilson...
a month ago
My education
continues. Here is “Artillery” (Hazards,
1930) by the English poet Wilfrid Wilson Gibson, previously unknown to me:
“All night I
sat beside the bed
And watched
that senseless moaning head
Backwards
and forwards toss and toss,
When
suddenly he sat upright
And...
The Marginalian
Octavia Butler on Religion and the Spirituality of Symbiosis
"On many levels, we wind up being strengthened by what we join, or what joins us, as well as by what...
a year ago
"On many levels, we wind up being strengthened by what we join, or what joins us, as well as by what we combat."
Anecdotal Evidence
'Interior Decoration Doesn't Count"
Just last
week, and not for the first time, I had a dream set in Kay’s Books in downtown
Cleveland,...
9 months ago
Just last
week, and not for the first time, I had a dream set in Kay’s Books in downtown
Cleveland, where I visited often as a kid and worked in 1975. I was in the
basement in the general hardback fiction section where I saw the copy of Under the Volcano I bought there
forty-nine...
Anecdotal Evidence
'An Air of Baffled Absence'
R.L. Barth
has sent a new epigram, “Baffled,” not overtly related to the Vietnam War:
“I see...
5 months ago
R.L. Barth
has sent a new epigram, “Baffled,” not overtly related to the Vietnam War:
“I see these
hands on the deck railing, but
Whose are
they? Have they any meaning? What?”
Some readers
will understand. The familiar can become strange with age. That’s not always a...
Josh Thompson
Daily Exercise - Russian Kettlebells
Exercise. It makes most people either cringe or salivate.
Those of you who love exercising for the...
over a year ago
Exercise. It makes most people either cringe or salivate.
Those of you who love exercising for the sake of exercising - you can stop reading now. This information is probably not relevant to you.
Those of you who don’t like to exercise, but know you really should exercise...
The American Scholar
Interlude: The Idea of “The West”
A brief look at a grand narrative
The post Interlude: The Idea of “The West” appeared first on The...
9 months ago
A brief look at a grand narrative
The post Interlude: The Idea of “The West” appeared first on The American Scholar.
Blog -...
Book Review - Iron John
Iron John by Robert Bly is a classic book about men. It has legions of
ardent fans, but I...
over a year ago
Iron John by Robert Bly is a classic book about men. It has legions of
ardent fans, but I reluctantly admit I am not one of the more zealous.
Although the book has high points – the classic story of Iron John as put
down by the Grimm brothers stands out to me, as well as an...
The Marginalian
Comet & Star: A Cosmic Fable about the Rhythms and Consolations of Friendship
People pass through our lives and change us, tilting our orbit with their own. Sometimes, if the...
3 months ago
People pass through our lives and change us, tilting our orbit with their own. Sometimes, if the common gravitational center is strong enough, they return, they stay. Sometimes they travel on. But they change us all the same. The great consolation of the cosmic order is the...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Msty
The easiest way to use local and online AI models.
Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
4 months ago
The easiest way to use local and online AI models.
Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
Anecdotal Evidence
'Pick Up a Machete and Start Exploring'
A splendid
day for American literature: born on March 1 are Ralph Ellison (1914), Howard
Nemerov...
10 months ago
A splendid
day for American literature: born on March 1 are Ralph Ellison (1914), Howard
Nemerov (1920) and Richard Wilbur (1921). I’m reminded of how important contemporary
American writers were to me when I was young, in the 60s and 70s. Everything
was new and promising, and I...
The Marginalian
Magnolias and the Meaning of Life: Science, Poetry, Existentialism
On cruelty, kindness, and the song of life.
a year ago
On cruelty, kindness, and the song of life.
The Marginalian
Time and the Soul: Philosopher Jacob Needleman on Our Search for Meaning
"The real significance of our problem with time... is a crisis of meaning... The root of our modern...
11 months ago
"The real significance of our problem with time... is a crisis of meaning... The root of our modern problem with time is neither technological, sociological, economic nor psychological. It is metaphysical. It is a question of the meaning of human life itself."
Josh Thompson
Injury Impedes Improvement
Kristi and I have been in Colorado for three months, I’ve been climbing regularly for two, I am back...
over a year ago
Kristi and I have been in Colorado for three months, I’ve been climbing regularly for two, I am back in shape and it feels good.
I am tempted to throw myself into climbing again. To climb every day, or maybe every other day, and finish every session with training. But here’s the...
Anecdotal Evidence
"A Fury of Self-Deception, Malice, and Conceit'
There’s no
getting away from the din. Who knew the human voice, individually and in the
collective,...
2 months ago
There’s no
getting away from the din. Who knew the human voice, individually and in the
collective, could carry on this way? An innocent question or observation prompts
a sonic explosion. I’m unable to get that angry and loud so quickly. Perhaps
if my family were threatened....
The Marginalian
A Taste of How It Feels to Be Free: Pioneering Psychoanalyst Karen Horney on Our Inner Conflicts,...
"The most comprehensive formulation of therapeutic goals is the striving for wholeheartedness: to be...
a year ago
"The most comprehensive formulation of therapeutic goals is the striving for wholeheartedness: to be without pretense, to be emotionally sincere, to be able to put the whole of oneself into one’s feelings, one’s work, one’s beliefs. It can be approximated only to the extent that...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Its Super-Ego Has Gone AWOL'
The American
philosopher Brand Blanshard delivered the Riecker Memorial Lecture at the
University of...
3 months ago
The American
philosopher Brand Blanshard delivered the Riecker Memorial Lecture at the
University of Arizona in 1962. It was published that year as a twenty-three-page
pamphlet titled “On Sanity in Thought and Art.” For much of the text Blanshard
reviews various twentieth-century...
Josh Thompson
$150 Custom-Made Standing Desk
My desk/our kitchen table
Standing desks are
all the
rage. (I’m still waiting for
walking desks...
over a year ago
My desk/our kitchen table
Standing desks are
all the
rage. (I’m still waiting for
walking desks to catch up.)
Kristi and I outfitted our space with reclaimed furniture from Craigslist (also known as “cheap”), so we wanted to keep it going with a desk. My setup at our kitchen...
The Marginalian
Prisons We Choose to Live Inside: Doris Lessing on the Antidote to Self-Righteousness and Our Best...
This is the history of the world: revolutionaries turning into tyrants, leaders who claim to stand...
2 months ago
This is the history of the world: revolutionaries turning into tyrants, leaders who claim to stand with the masses turning the individuals within them on each other, stirring certainties and self-righteousness to distract from the uncomfortable unknowns, from the great open...
The American Scholar
Rap Rap Rap
The post Rap Rap Rap appeared first on The American Scholar.
3 months ago
The post Rap Rap Rap appeared first on The American Scholar.
Josh Thompson
Five Lessons Learned in Buenos Aires
Note: This is an unedited draft of a post from July 5, 2015. Almost exactly one year ago, written...
over a year ago
Note: This is an unedited draft of a post from July 5, 2015. Almost exactly one year ago, written after a week in Buenos Aires. Since writing this post, Kristi and I have continued on to more than a year of non-stop travel, though we’re settling down back in Golden, CO in about...
Anecdotal Evidence
'The Role Is a Role Worth Perfecting'
“The tragic
Portuguese Jew of Amsterdam wrote that there is nothing the free man thinks of
less than...
12 months ago
“The tragic
Portuguese Jew of Amsterdam wrote that there is nothing the free man thinks of
less than he does of death. But that sort of free man is no more than a dead
man; he is free only from life’s wellspring, lacking in love, a slave to his
freedom. The thought that I must...
Journal and Links by...
✏️ Boy Meets Girl
At the request of my much loyal readership (I’m looking at you Lacey), the story of how I came to be...
over a year ago
At the request of my much loyal readership (I’m looking at you Lacey), the story of how I came to be with girl seems to be of interest. I know, I know. I disappear for a bit from writing and then I return smitten, enamoured and very much exploring a journey I’m quite glad to be...
Anecdotal Evidence
'He Liked to Hold Ideas Up to the Light'
The single most
influential book in my life, the one that with time altered the way I think, not...
a year ago
The single most
influential book in my life, the one that with time altered the way I think, not just what I think, is Guy’s Davenport’s The Geography of the Imagination (North
Point Press, 1981). I bought it that year in a lesbian bookstore in Manhattan. Over
the previous decade...
Journal and Links by...
✏️ I Don't Have Facebook
I don’t have an account with the big blue F. It’s 2015. The social network is almost 11 years old....
over a year ago
I don’t have an account with the big blue F. It’s 2015. The social network is almost 11 years old. It’s remarkable — over a decade in existence and, mostly, still going strong.
I read about it a lot. I have friends who work there. I have been recruited and asked by the same...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Expanding in Edale
I’ve been making things in response to this place since my teens, most notably as a young visual...
6 months ago
I’ve been making things in response to this place since my teens, most notably as a young visual artist and again now, having reconnected with that wide-eyed younger version of myself.
— Simon Collison
Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
Anecdotal Evidence
'Provided That He Gives Us What We Can Enjoy'
A reader is
enjoying Tristram Shandy and passing
along choice selections from Sterne’s novel. This...
a year ago
A reader is
enjoying Tristram Shandy and passing
along choice selections from Sterne’s novel. This she gleaned from Book V,
Chap. 32, spoken by Tristram’s father:
“—Here is
the glass for pedagogues, preceptors, tutors, governors, gerund-grinders, and
bear-leaders, to view...
The American Scholar
Red Tide Warning
Living on Florida’s Gulf Coast means having to coexist with pervasive and toxic algal blooms—and...
8 months ago
Living on Florida’s Gulf Coast means having to coexist with pervasive and toxic algal blooms—and neighbors who don’t always believe what they see
The post Red Tide Warning appeared first on The American Scholar.
The Elysian
Humanity from the perspective of robots
Talking points for our literary salon next week.
8 months ago
Talking points for our literary salon next week.
The Marginalian
Marie Howe’s Stunning Hymn of Humanity, Animated
"It began as an almost inaudible hum..."
9 months ago
"It began as an almost inaudible hum..."
Josh Thompson
How to Wake Up Early
An understanding of sleep, and attempts to wake up early
(Read Part Two, and Part Three)
My...
over a year ago
An understanding of sleep, and attempts to wake up early
(Read Part Two, and Part Three)
My understanding of sleep has evolved. When I was born, I spent most of my time asleep (if I recall correctly…) and gradually spent less and less time sleeping, until I was down to about...
The Marginalian
Blue Glass
Not long after writing about the bowerbird’s enchantment in blue, I walked out of my house and...
a year ago
Not long after writing about the bowerbird’s enchantment in blue, I walked out of my house and gasped at the sight of what looked like two extraordinary jewels sparkling on a bed of yellow leaves, right there on the sidewalk — chunks of cobalt glass, much larger than what a...
This Space
The end of literature, part four
This tweet has been seen thousands of times since it was posted on the 82nd anniversary of Britain...
over a year ago
This tweet has been seen thousands of times since it was posted on the 82nd anniversary of Britain and France declaring war on Germany. Not that the coincidence means much. At least, no more than what the general population, interest and powerful mean here, or indeed what poetry...
Ben Borgers
I Keep Rewriting My Personal Website
over a year ago
Anecdotal Evidence
'. . . Or That He Did Not'
Some of us
enjoy footnotes and other annotations. Thoughtful, non-Kinbotean notes accompanying
older...
7 months ago
Some of us
enjoy footnotes and other annotations. Thoughtful, non-Kinbotean notes accompanying
older texts can identify historical figures and help us decipher obsolete words. As
Joyce advised in the Wake: “Wipe your
glosses with what you know.” My preference with Shakespeare...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Why A.I. Isn’t Going to Make Art
The task that generative A.I. has been most successful at is lowering our expectations, both of the...
4 months ago
The task that generative A.I. has been most successful at is lowering our expectations, both of the things we read and of ourselves when we write anything for others to read. It is a fundamentally dehumanizing technology because it treats us as less than what we are: creators and...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Bluster (New Style) Invokes the Public Good'
I write
about money more often than ever before at my day job. I’m not naïve and understand
that...
a year ago
I write
about money more often than ever before at my day job. I’m not naïve and understand
that research can be costly and professors don’t work for the love of it, but money
has become the barometer of worth. Small grants can be ignored regardless of
the intrinsic worth of the...
Josh Thompson
Winter on Two Pairs of Socks
We’re
minimalists, mostly. We try to not have a bunch of stuff. This naturally extends to the...
over a year ago
We’re
minimalists, mostly. We try to not have a bunch of stuff. This naturally extends to the wardrobe.
I’ll cover more about what we wear another time, but for now, I want to give you an idea. With the right socks, you can go an entire winter with just two pairs of socks. You...
Astral Codex Ten
Hidden Open Thread 360.5
...
a month ago
Anecdotal Evidence
'I Hope This Explanation Is Wrong'
One of life’s
unsolved puzzles, especially for readers and writers: How can certain arrangements
of...
5 months ago
One of life’s
unsolved puzzles, especially for readers and writers: How can certain arrangements
of words encountered in childhood or youth, and revisited regularly for a
lifetime, still inspire delight, while others, in effect, evaporate before we
hear them? In the latter...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Truck Camping is Here to Eat Van Life's Lunch
We’re reaching the tipping point of an oversaturated custom sprinter van market. There are hundreds...
6 months ago
We’re reaching the tipping point of an oversaturated custom sprinter van market. There are hundreds of brands all attempting to do very similar things at scale, as if they’re late to the overbuilt expensive van party. Customer interest feels like it is swinging back to simplicity...
sbensu
Interfaces for logical migrations
This post explains how you can use interfaces to make data model and database migrations easier.
a year ago
This post explains how you can use interfaces to make data model and database migrations easier.
This Space
Wall by Jen Craig
“This novel gives the reader one of the best depictions of thinking in fiction that I have read in a...
a year ago
“This novel gives the reader one of the best depictions of thinking in fiction that I have read in a long time” – Talking Big
"... combines exactitude and vagueness, immediacy and distance, to approximate how scatty, worm-like human thought might be represented on the page" – The...
The Elysian
Week 7: Boost your essays all over the internet
9 months ago
Anecdotal Evidence
'Intensely Cultivated and Painstakingly Honest'
In the brief foreword to her first prose collection, Predilections
(1955), Marianne Moore writes as...
2 months ago
In the brief foreword to her first prose collection, Predilections
(1955), Marianne Moore writes as good an apologia for her manner of writing, among others, as I’ve ever encountered:
“Silence is
more eloquent than speech – a truism; but sometimes something that someone...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Appear to the Public to be Some Sort of Miracle'
On Christmas
Eve 1890, Chekhov writes to his friend and editor Alexi Suvorin:
“I believe
in both...
5 months ago
On Christmas
Eve 1890, Chekhov writes to his friend and editor Alexi Suvorin:
“I believe
in both [Robert] Koch and spermine, and I praise the Lord. Kochines, spermines,
etc. all appear to the public to be some sort of miracle that has sprung
unexpectedly from someone’s head like...
The American Scholar
Turning the World to Powder
Jay Owens on the tiny particles that float through our lives
The post Turning the World to Powder...
6 months ago
Jay Owens on the tiny particles that float through our lives
The post Turning the World to Powder appeared first on The American Scholar.
Journal and Links by...
✏️ Technologically Content
My iPhone 14 Pro is paid off. I've been on the iPhone Upgrade Program since it debuted but decided...
3 months ago
My iPhone 14 Pro is paid off. I've been on the iPhone Upgrade Program since it debuted but decided to skip last year's 15. This year's 16, while initially tempting in theory, has actively persuaded me to skip it again, likely until I need a new phone.
I design mobile apps. It's...
Anecdotal Evidence
'He Is the Andy Warhol of Art'
Guy
Davenport was our Johnny Appleseed of culture. He was an academic who published
in Harper’s and...
7 months ago
Guy
Davenport was our Johnny Appleseed of culture. He was an academic who published
in Harper’s and the Journal of the American Institute of Architects;
Life magazine and Art News; National Review and Inquiry.
He sowed allusions without regard for pretentious pieties. He loved...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Give Him the Darkest Inch Your Shelf Allows'
Its 1,498
pages tip the scales at 3.2 pounds: Collected
Poems of Edwin Arlington Robinson,...
9 months ago
Its 1,498
pages tip the scales at 3.2 pounds: Collected
Poems of Edwin Arlington Robinson, originally published in 1929. At Kaboom Books I bought the twelfth printing, from 1959. The dustjacket is a little
frayed around the edges but the book is otherwise sturdy. It collects the...
Anecdotal Evidence
'We Were Nothing in Ourselves Nothing More'
“[H]e gave
us some of the best poems of our times. And, after all, one must thank a man
for what he...
a year ago
“[H]e gave
us some of the best poems of our times. And, after all, one must thank a man
for what he has done and not condemn him for his failures.”
A timely,
guilt-inducing reminder. It’s easy to scold a writer for not producing a masterpiece
each time he goes to work. Good...
Anecdotal Evidence
'Remarkable Literary Judgment'
She was
twelve or thirteen, a girl in a hooded sweatshirt seated beside a woman I
assume was her...
5 months ago
She was
twelve or thirteen, a girl in a hooded sweatshirt seated beside a woman I
assume was her mother. She sat on the aisle two rows ahead of me. The cabin of
the plane glowed with screens while she was reading Andrew R. MacAndrew’s 1961 translation
of Dead Souls, the Signet...
Anecdotal Evidence
'A Great or Wonderful Thing'
“Too greedy of
Magnalities, we are apt to make but favourable experiments concerning...
2 days ago
“Too greedy of
Magnalities, we are apt to make but favourable experiments concerning welcome
Truths.”
Sir Thomas Browne in Pseudodoxia
Epidemica (1646), also known as Vulgar Errors, dismisses such
notions as the existence of unicorns and the impact of garlic on magnetism. In
the...
The American Scholar
A Forgotten Turner Classic
Who was George Eyser, the one-legged German-American gymnast who astounded at the Olympic Games?
The...
7 months ago
Who was George Eyser, the one-legged German-American gymnast who astounded at the Olympic Games?
The post A Forgotten Turner Classic appeared first on The American Scholar.
Anecdotal Evidence
'To Be at Home in Other Places'
At his day
job my current barber is a counselor working with street people who have alcohol
and/or...
a month ago
At his day
job my current barber is a counselor working with street people who have alcohol
and/or drug problems. Like most in that field, he values his clients and
dislikes the bosses, who live by the dictates of bureaucracy. Barbers are like
bartenders. The good ones usually...
Wuthering...
Seneca and Marcus Aurelius and their Stoic self-help books - I shall not be afraid when my last hour...
The curious thing about Stoicism is its long-lasting
survival in the self-help genre, curious at...
a year ago
The curious thing about Stoicism is its long-lasting
survival in the self-help genre, curious at least until I read Seneca’s Letters
from a Stoic (1st C.) several years ago and discovered that it was a self-help
book, one of the founding self-help books.
The Meditations of...
Escaping Flatland
Swimming in July
Just the pure physical joy of thrashing your arms around in water. To fill the kid’s buckets and...
5 months ago
Just the pure physical joy of thrashing your arms around in water. To fill the kid’s buckets and throw it at the sun—the way the water falls apart into drops, and then into mist, the way a rainbow appears for a second and is gone.
Anecdotal Evidence
'And Talked Down Speechless Death'
In my November 1 post I asked, “Does anyone know anything about Edward Case?” I had stumbled
on a...
2 weeks ago
In my November 1 post I asked, “Does anyone know anything about Edward Case?” I had stumbled
on a gifted poet previously unknown to me who had died in 1985. This week I heard
from his son James Case, an architect living in New Jersey, who briefed me on
his father and his work....
Wuthering...
Metamorphoses, cantos 7 through 10 - more Heroides, more gore, more of everything - What meen my...
Metamorphoses is fluid, quick, and ever-changing. Let’s look at cantos VII through X, which...
10 months ago
Metamorphoses is fluid, quick, and ever-changing. Let’s look at cantos VII through X, which have
their share of famous stories, stories famous, or as famous as they are,
because of Metamorphoses. Venus
and Adonis, Baucis and Philemon, Orpheus and Eurydice, Pygmalion. Icarus –...
Anecdotal Evidence
'An Immense Special Talent'
D.G. Myers
and I met in person only once, in March 2012, when David came to Houston to see
his...
3 months ago
D.G. Myers
and I met in person only once, in March 2012, when David came to Houston to see
his oncologist. We had lunch in a Mexican restaurant and talked for hours, then
I drove him to the hospital. He gave me the Library of America’s collection of
Henry James’ writings on...
Journal and Links by...
✏️ Mama and Me ‘24
Jen and I recently returned from our annual visit to see my family in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Taking...
3 months ago
Jen and I recently returned from our annual visit to see my family in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Taking photos with the family has become even more important as the years go by, and this core memory captured by Jen of my mama and me, is a great one for posterity.
Read on...
Escaping Flatland
A summary of what I wrote in 2024
A man sets out to draw the world.
a month ago
A man sets out to draw the world.
Ben Borgers
Best Type of Bathroom Lock
over a year ago
Escaping Flatland
A measuring device that tells me what is interesting
+ links
3 months ago
Anecdotal Evidence
'Anticipating Since Morning a Successful Hunt'
The neighbors
had several tall ash trees growing in their backyard behind the garage and the
trunks...
10 months ago
The neighbors
had several tall ash trees growing in their backyard behind the garage and the
trunks were a favorite perch for Polyphemus and especially cecropia moths. These
are large insects, beautifully colored, with “eyes” on their wings. To budding lepidopterists
they were...
Journal and Links by...
🔗 Probably Riding
Hello. I’m probably riding my bike.
Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
5 months ago
Hello. I’m probably riding my bike.
Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
The American Scholar
On Book
August Wilson’s play just hit the big screen, but even greater rewards await on the page
The post On...
a month ago
August Wilson’s play just hit the big screen, but even greater rewards await on the page
The post On Book appeared first on The American Scholar.
The Marginalian
We Are Free to Change the World: Hannah Arendt, the Power of Defiant Goodwill, and the Art of...
"It is when the experience of powerlessness is at its most acute, when history seems at its most...
10 months ago
"It is when the experience of powerlessness is at its most acute, when history seems at its most bleak, that the determination to think like a human being, creatively, courageously, and complicatedly, matters the most."
The Marginalian
The Paradise Notebooks: A Poet and a Geologist’s Love Letter to Life Lensed Through a Mountain
"Each world bears all the worlds we might find within it. If you understand one outcropping of...
8 months ago
"Each world bears all the worlds we might find within it. If you understand one outcropping of stone, or one wildflower, or one hummingbird — if we see our way along the tracery of cause and effect, the mystery of change and recreation — then we are led to everything we see, and...
Josh Thompson
Three Ways to Decide What to be When You Grow Up
Recently, I have had to explain to people what is it that I want to do. This question is difficult...
over a year ago
Recently, I have had to explain to people what is it that I want to do. This question is difficult to answer for two reasons. The first reason is I am not yet strongly pulled into a specific position. My ideal answer would be “I want to do X role at company Y.” Short. Concise....
The American Scholar
Lift Off
The post Lift Off appeared first on The American Scholar.
8 months ago
The post Lift Off appeared first on The American Scholar.
The Marginalian
The Power of Being a Heretic: The Forgotten Visionary Jane Ellen Harrison on Critical Thinking,...
"If we are to be true and worthy heretics, we need not only new heads, but new hearts, and, most of...
a year ago
"If we are to be true and worthy heretics, we need not only new heads, but new hearts, and, most of all, that new emotional imagination... begotten of enlarged sympathies and a more sensitive habit of feeling."
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