Babies are adorable creatures
Who mix and match their parents’ features.
Wednesday, February 27, 2019
Nummy
Corn chips may not be
The world’s best snack,
But pardon my crumbs
While I crunch through a sack!
The world’s best snack,
But pardon my crumbs
While I crunch through a sack!
Monday, February 25, 2019
Social and Antisocial Media
People on Twitter
Seem bitter.
People on Facebook just fritter
Their time away
Looking at cats all day.
Seem bitter.
People on Facebook just fritter
Their time away
Looking at cats all day.
In Deep
I built a drill to bore
A tunnel to the earth’s core.
My design was truly complete
Except for one thing about heat.
Imagine the sorrow I felt
When it just happened to melt.
A tunnel to the earth’s core.
My design was truly complete
Except for one thing about heat.
Imagine the sorrow I felt
When it just happened to melt.
Saturday, February 23, 2019
What People Respond To
In the Wall St. Journal today there was an article by a college professor who found that his students responded well to a course on Arthur Miller, whose heyday was in the 1950s. He said that Miller became passe partly because his plays followed a formal pattern and because Miller was a universalist not an identity-politics guy.
As an aside, the formal pattern is that of the Scribean well-made play, as re-worked by Ibsen, whose structure really goes way back to the ancient Greeks and probably well before that. Basically it's a story with a beginning, middle, end and some kind of point. In the 60s, there was a concerted effort to depart from this structure. Anyway, most people stayed loyal to the structure in their heart of hearts, because there's something primally human about it.
I was also reading an excerpt from an essay about Chinese science fiction. The claim was that Chinese scifi is still full of energy and optimism, and that this remains true for American scifi films, but not for American scifi writing. Well, I suspect that's true for some segment, but certainly not all, because I've certainly seen recent energetic scifi writing, including some by Sarah Hoyt and Lois McMaster Bujold. Probably they're not the people the Chinese are perceiving as high-status in terms of American critical reception.
Critical reception can be misleading
About what people are actually reading.
As an aside, the formal pattern is that of the Scribean well-made play, as re-worked by Ibsen, whose structure really goes way back to the ancient Greeks and probably well before that. Basically it's a story with a beginning, middle, end and some kind of point. In the 60s, there was a concerted effort to depart from this structure. Anyway, most people stayed loyal to the structure in their heart of hearts, because there's something primally human about it.
I was also reading an excerpt from an essay about Chinese science fiction. The claim was that Chinese scifi is still full of energy and optimism, and that this remains true for American scifi films, but not for American scifi writing. Well, I suspect that's true for some segment, but certainly not all, because I've certainly seen recent energetic scifi writing, including some by Sarah Hoyt and Lois McMaster Bujold. Probably they're not the people the Chinese are perceiving as high-status in terms of American critical reception.
Critical reception can be misleading
About what people are actually reading.
Thursday, February 21, 2019
Hoaxed
Assuming for now that the local police have cracked the Smollet case, I want to say that it was an excellent hoax in one respect: it got a lot of people emotionally involved in the drama, infused with righteousness and ready to condemn their opponents who would dare to doubt the veracity of the victim. It was one of these unlikely “wedge” dramas that casts one set of citizens as heroic and the other set as villainous. It pretended to present the MAGA tribe as just what their opponents always suspected they truly were.
They felt so sure
But they weren’t.
Now they endure
Being burnt.
They felt so sure
But they weren’t.
Now they endure
Being burnt.
Wednesday, February 20, 2019
Dramatics
If in fact he faked this crime
He could start by paying for the detectives’ overtime.
There’s enough bad stuff that happens in this city.
No need to make it up - it’s just a pity.
He could start by paying for the detectives’ overtime.
There’s enough bad stuff that happens in this city.
No need to make it up - it’s just a pity.
More of the Same
Rain and snow and rain,
Covering every lane
With a slippery layer of ice.
Not nice, Mother Nature, not nice!
Covering every lane
With a slippery layer of ice.
Not nice, Mother Nature, not nice!
Monday, February 18, 2019
Unraveling
The Maga-country story seems to be coming apart. I guess the coming days will tell. There were always public details that were head-scratchers, beginning with the fact that downtown Chicago is not Maga-country.
I'm interested in the people who are now writing things like "I wanted this story to be true".
Did they want it to be true
To validate their point of view?
I'm interested in the people who are now writing things like "I wanted this story to be true".
Did they want it to be true
To validate their point of view?
Hero’s Lot
MacBeth was wrong to take his wife’s suggestions,
Othello fell for his lieutenant’s tricks,
Young Hamlet seemed to asked too many questions,
And that’s what got these fellows in a fix.
Henry the Fifth, however, did just fine,
Despite a youth of foolishness and play,
Despite consuming tankards full of wine.
If there’s a moral here, I cannot say.
In Tragedy the playwright plops you down
Into a plot you’re not prepared to handle.
He gives you virtues, wealth, and fair renown,
But never quite enough. Out goes your candle.
Your odds are better, really it’s no mystery,
If you are made the hero of a History.
Othello fell for his lieutenant’s tricks,
Young Hamlet seemed to asked too many questions,
And that’s what got these fellows in a fix.
Henry the Fifth, however, did just fine,
Despite a youth of foolishness and play,
Despite consuming tankards full of wine.
If there’s a moral here, I cannot say.
In Tragedy the playwright plops you down
Into a plot you’re not prepared to handle.
He gives you virtues, wealth, and fair renown,
But never quite enough. Out goes your candle.
Your odds are better, really it’s no mystery,
If you are made the hero of a History.
Thursday, February 14, 2019
Wednesday, February 13, 2019
Mitochondria
Frankly I’m enraptured
Mitochondria got captured
By some old ancestral cell.
They’re my favorite organelle!
Mitochondria got captured
By some old ancestral cell.
They’re my favorite organelle!
Tuesday, February 12, 2019
Brrr
Most people claim that cats have fur.
From what I’ve seen, I must concur.
But I’ve heard there’s one that’s hairless.
In this weather, that sounds careless.
From what I’ve seen, I must concur.
But I’ve heard there’s one that’s hairless.
In this weather, that sounds careless.
Monday, February 11, 2019
Sunday, February 10, 2019
Thessalonians 3:10
If you're unwilling to work,
It's often hard to find pay.
How can we help those who shirk?
Surely there must be a way!
It's often hard to find pay.
How can we help those who shirk?
Surely there must be a way!
Saturday, February 09, 2019
Merchants of Truth
Jill Abramson, former editor of the NY Times, has written a book about modern journalism, calling for a maintenance of high standards... and then the book got called out for plagiarism. And now she says mistakes were made.
What is wrong with these people? This came from a major publisher - Simon & Schuster.
Professors have software for catching plagiarists. It's used at many colleges. Couldn't Simon & Schuster spring for such software?
Enough publishers have been caught like this - with celebrity authors - that they ought to have the sense to protect themselves.
I wonder if celebrity authors are a little more inclined to pull this nonsense because many of them have fallen prey to a sense of invulnerability that can come with high status.
No matter how great your renown,
Though you soar way up high with the birds,
If you steal other writers' words
They will angrily shoot you down.
What is wrong with these people? This came from a major publisher - Simon & Schuster.
Professors have software for catching plagiarists. It's used at many colleges. Couldn't Simon & Schuster spring for such software?
Enough publishers have been caught like this - with celebrity authors - that they ought to have the sense to protect themselves.
I wonder if celebrity authors are a little more inclined to pull this nonsense because many of them have fallen prey to a sense of invulnerability that can come with high status.
No matter how great your renown,
Though you soar way up high with the birds,
If you steal other writers' words
They will angrily shoot you down.
Tuesday, February 05, 2019
Blondie and the Cold
I've got a yellow Lab. Labs have a rep of being good in cold weather, and of being outdoorsy. Blondie likes the outdoors, but she doesn't like being alone in the yard. She's so sociable, she seems to get lonely, despite the intermittent walkers-by. And when it comes to the cold, well, if it's down around zero Fahrenheit, she really doesn't like it much. The big vulnerability seems to be in her paws. Of course, in humans, it's the digits that get cold first, too. So I ordered some wax to put on her paws for the extreme cold, because she doesn't seem to want to wear booties.
But tonight I took her for a walk in a pretty good downpour, with temperatures just above freezing. So that was a cold shower, by human standards. Didn't bother her at all. I suppose that matches to the breed's original function - helping hunt ducks in the autumn, gladly diving into cold water to retrieve ducks that have fallen into a pond, and so forth.
She also has the "retrieving" characteristic. She carries things around in her mouth all day.
It's too bad I'm not a hunter! She'd probably enjoy it.
Would she be a good retriever?
I'm a firm believer.
But tonight I took her for a walk in a pretty good downpour, with temperatures just above freezing. So that was a cold shower, by human standards. Didn't bother her at all. I suppose that matches to the breed's original function - helping hunt ducks in the autumn, gladly diving into cold water to retrieve ducks that have fallen into a pond, and so forth.
She also has the "retrieving" characteristic. She carries things around in her mouth all day.
It's too bad I'm not a hunter! She'd probably enjoy it.
Would she be a good retriever?
I'm a firm believer.
Monday, February 04, 2019
So Sue Me
Read about a show-boating anti-natalist in India, who claims he wants to sue his parents for giving birth to him without his consent.
No one consents in advance to the gift of birth.
But without it, what is anything worth?
No one consents in advance to the gift of birth.
But without it, what is anything worth?
Sunday, February 03, 2019
Missed Opportunities by Jillian Leff
I went in with good expectations, but my wife was with me and she is a tougher critic than I am. Well, she was laughing from the beginning, always a good sign with a comedy!
I got to know Jillian Leff when she acted in a play of mine a couple of years ago. She was a talented performer onstage and a fun person to talk to offstage - full of witty-but-upbeat observations about contemporary life.
Now she's starring in a play of her own, put on by the Cuckoo's Theater Project Company. It's a romantic comedy of a modern, Millenial sort, involving a woman (Max) trying to attract the romantic attention of a man who thinks she's a lesbian. Of course, she could just tell him that she's not, right? But, no, for a variety of reasons she is reluctant to take the straightforward (ahem) approach, and instead embarks on a rather funny course of deception, which gets deeper and deeper, as deception does. You know the truth is going to spill or explode eventually, but the tension keeps building.
The acting was very funny. The set and lighting design was an elegant solution for a play that had a lot of scene changing. The sound design provided us with some amusing stuff when characters are working their electronic devices, including a voice-over so that we could eavesdrop on what our heroine was typing when she was writing her blog entries.
I have a minor complaint: I wish the actors had delivered their lines a little bit slower. Maybe I'm just old, but I know I was missing some funny jokes now and then! The repartee was crisp and new. As long as I'm mentioning my age, I should mention that the Den Theatre's third floor spaces are reachable only by stairs. Not a problem for me or my wife, but I know if could be an issue for some.
Jillian told me she has a couple more full-length plays in the works, which pleased me greatly, because it gives me more of her work to look forward to.
I enjoyed this opportunity
To laugh at some human lunacy!
I got to know Jillian Leff when she acted in a play of mine a couple of years ago. She was a talented performer onstage and a fun person to talk to offstage - full of witty-but-upbeat observations about contemporary life.
Now she's starring in a play of her own, put on by the Cuckoo's Theater Project Company. It's a romantic comedy of a modern, Millenial sort, involving a woman (Max) trying to attract the romantic attention of a man who thinks she's a lesbian. Of course, she could just tell him that she's not, right? But, no, for a variety of reasons she is reluctant to take the straightforward (ahem) approach, and instead embarks on a rather funny course of deception, which gets deeper and deeper, as deception does. You know the truth is going to spill or explode eventually, but the tension keeps building.
The acting was very funny. The set and lighting design was an elegant solution for a play that had a lot of scene changing. The sound design provided us with some amusing stuff when characters are working their electronic devices, including a voice-over so that we could eavesdrop on what our heroine was typing when she was writing her blog entries.
I have a minor complaint: I wish the actors had delivered their lines a little bit slower. Maybe I'm just old, but I know I was missing some funny jokes now and then! The repartee was crisp and new. As long as I'm mentioning my age, I should mention that the Den Theatre's third floor spaces are reachable only by stairs. Not a problem for me or my wife, but I know if could be an issue for some.
Jillian told me she has a couple more full-length plays in the works, which pleased me greatly, because it gives me more of her work to look forward to.
I enjoyed this opportunity
To laugh at some human lunacy!
Saturday, February 02, 2019
That Day Again
Today it occurred to me that Bill Murray had starred in 2 films where one of his co-stars was a varmint.
Caddyshack is a less coherent film, due to improvising without a script; it was stolen during editing by the gopher puppet, as the film editor searched for a way to give the film a comprehensive story arc. Groundhog Day had a solid script, and used actual groundhogs, who did not steal the film, but who did bite Murray, resulting in his being give a set of rabies shots.
Bill Murray’s costarring critters
Were very persistent - not quitters.
Caddyshack is a less coherent film, due to improvising without a script; it was stolen during editing by the gopher puppet, as the film editor searched for a way to give the film a comprehensive story arc. Groundhog Day had a solid script, and used actual groundhogs, who did not steal the film, but who did bite Murray, resulting in his being give a set of rabies shots.
Bill Murray’s costarring critters
Were very persistent - not quitters.
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