Archive for September, 2005
Spam Cake
Second only, in the realm of strange food fascinations, to an unnatural interest in congealed salads is my fixation on Spam, the Hormel canned-meat product. I still have hanging, right here where I can see it, a Spam Calendar from 2004, where each month features a recipe illustrated by an appetizing, full-color picture. Yumm. Someone [...]
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Alphabetical Ideology
I happened to be reading some columns by Cynthia Tucker at uExpress.com, which offers political columns by about a dozen, widely syndicated columnists, when I noticed something that I thought odd. In the list of columnists "On the Right", the writers' last names began with these letters: "B", "C", "G", "G", "K", and "L". In [...]
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Cheesy Dreams
Thanks to Annie at Maud Newton's blog, I got to read this fascinating report from the British Cheese Board* called "Sweet Dreams Are Made Of Cheese". With a title like that, you know it's going to be good. The thesis is simply stated at the outset: The age old myth that cheese gives you nightmares [...]
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People Mulch
When I heard about this from someone, I thought it just sounded really cool (as it were), and would cut down on emission of green-house gases from crematoria, and promote the planting of trees. Another part of it, of course, is that I just like Swedes. A town in Sweden plans to become the first [...]
Share on FacebookKatrina: Whose Chaos?
So, conservatives spin this as the result of the "liberal media" out of control, liberals spin it as conservative hysteria out of control. I don't think this report is all that surprising, but with all the spinning most everyone seems too dizzy to see what the real lessons are. In New Orleans' whiter, affluent western [...]
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Connecticut Civil Unions on October 1
My friend Ron Suresha, who lives in New London, CT, sends me this press release concerning the beginning of civil-unions for same-sex couples in that state. This is cool: when was the last time you saw a press release that read excited? He asks that we circulate, so, as part of the historic record: Subject: [...]
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To Some Extent
It's fun — indeed, one of my favorite pasttimes — to hear what new catch phrase politicians will come up with next. The phrases don't always catch on, but they keep trying; it seems there's a sort of verbal Darwinism at work. A notable example of unfortunately longevity was Nixon's "point in time", which finally [...]
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Taxes Buy Civilization
How I look forward to the day when I can again pay my fair share of taxes to a government that uses it to keep buying civilization, rather than trying to destroy it. [Shakespeare's Sister, "It’s Not Penance Unless You’re Sorry, Though", 27 September 2005.] Share on Facebook
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Congealed Meal
A treasure from tonight's trip to the library (as mentioned in the previous post) was finding, on the book cart of cheap books for sale, a cookbook* from 1981 called "Favorite Brand Name Recipe Cookbook". I always like these, and this one is just old enough to have some fantastic recipes from a slightly earlier [...]
Share on FacebookBanned Books
Today I learned that this is the week in which the American Library Association promotes "Banned Book Week"; at their website they conveniently provide a Suggested Activities and Action Guide, chock full of ideas. The same person# also pointed out the article "The American banned list reveals a society with seious hang-ups", by Ben MacIntyre [...]
Share on FacebookA Tragic Anti-Hero
When Avedon Carol wrote If I were a kinder person, I might actually feel sorry for the boy king – he tries so hard to be better than his dad, but he either repeats his errors accidentally or, in trying to out-do him, screws up royally by deliberately departing from the old man's decisions. she [...]
Share on FacebookCowflops of Complacency
"We are not gray grains of oatmeal in a porridge of privilege," said Lloyd Bentsen in his acceptance speech at the Democratic convention. Just so. Also, we are not cowflops of complacency in a meadow of mediocrity. We are not quasars of querulousness in a galaxy of greed. We are not pousse-cafés of presumption in [...]
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Prez Whiz
While doing some research this morning for a different essay, I read this assessment by Hendrik Hertzberg of a phrase in Bush's 2004 State of the Union Address: In last year’s State of the Union, Bush’s buzz phrase was “weapons of mass destruction,” the threat of which justified the impending conquest of Iraq. This year’s [...]
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Toe Monsters
The Republican movement against same-sex-marriage is purely a political tactic which feeds off the unjustified fears of easily influenced Americans, as we witnessed during last year's presidential campaign. Gay marriage does nothing to threaten you or your marriage, but the anti-gay right-wing wants to make you feel that way in order to consolidate their power. [...]
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Repeal the Second Law?
There is one major achievement of ninteenth-century science — namely, thermodynamics — that neither had significant practical application of which the public were aware nor penetrated the imagination of HMS [= "l'homme moyen sensuel" i.e., "the average man"]. To HMS the subject seems abstruse, and irrelevant to daily life. Moreover, it lacks visual appeal. One [...]
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Darwinism: Real vs. Social
Darwinism was more readily accepted by the Church in England than it was by the rigid Protestant sects of the New World, a pattern that is maintained by the almost complete absence of present-day controversy [NB: the author was writing this c. 1997] over evolution in Great Britain, in contrast to the continuing clashes between [...]
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Centuries Old Truths
A month ago I wrote a posting ("Mystery and Creationism") in which I suggested that Christian fundamentalists who feel that their religion is imcompatible with science should take the advice of the late Pope and ascribe the incomprehensibility to mystery, since mystery is theologically acceptable. In that piece, I quoted someone quoting Pope John Paul [...]
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Who Could Have Known?
You may remember the incident earlier this year when a small plane flew unexpectedly into DC airspace and our nation's capital responded to a terrorist red alert. I do, although I think it didn't come back into my mind until Frank Rich referred to "…the cinéma vérité of poor people screaming for their lives". Those [...]
Share on FacebookA Republican Motto
Today we were driving back from our Saturday shopping, and we talked for a moment about the latest bit of Bush League shenanigans, whatever it was — it's hard to keep track. However, I can say with certainty that it would have had something to do with bilking avearge Amerians in some way to line [...]
Share on FacebookGleick's Newton
Yesterday I finished reading Isaac Newton, by James Gleick (Pantheon Books, New York, 2003), and I was quite impressed by it. Gleick managed to write in what I think of as a "high" tone, a slightly lofty rhetorical style, on the poetic side, and sustain it throughout the book. It's a difficult voice to maintain, [...]
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