The Daily Blague

Weekend Open Thread: Métropolitain

RJK — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 13:30:57 +0000

Daily Office: Friday, 3 September 2010

RJK — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 03:59:34 +0000

¶ Sarah Idzik’s pieces at The Awl about adoption — Sarah herself was born in Korea prior to adoption by an American family living outside of Pittsburgh, is shaping up to be a must-read report on a fact of life that most Americans would prefer to overlook: assimilation into our society doesn’t just happen all by itself. And adoptees are often left with the uncomfortable recognition that no one is to blame for their sense of displacement.

Lauds

¶ The superb Toni Bentley writes about the first great American ballet, set to music by Tchaikovsky that was not intended for the stage: George Balanchine’s Serenade. (Wall Street Journal; via Arts Journal)

Prime

¶ At The Baseline Scenario, Peter Boone and Simon Johnson discuss the Irish debt crisis that is looming rather horribly at the moment. Their account of the bailout of Irish banks reminds us that the United States is not the only developed nation in which powerful people are overseeing the transfer of public wealth into private pockets — or, as here, converting private debts into public liabilities

Tierce

¶ Peter Smith reconsiders the “nitrite scare” — and notes, in passing, that many “nitrite-free” foods are still loaded with naturally-occurring nitrites. (Good)

Sext

¶ Dustin Kurtz is a very nice guy (we’ve met!), but he has the damnedest time trying to articulate his dislike of that big book that everybody’s talking about. But not to worry: this is only the first part of “Two McNally Jackson Booksellers Argue About Jonathan Franzen’s ‘Freedom’.”

Nones

¶ It’s possible that we like Uwe Buse’s account of Munich Re, the world’s largest re-insurer, because it sparkles with action-movie flash. (Spiegel Online; via Real Clear World)

Vespers

¶ The Rumpus has been running a series of personal essays in which writers reflect on the porousness of life and art. We’re particularly taken by the latest entry, Nº 19, in which Edward Schwarzschild muses richly, and never quite as creepily as he might (part of the thrill of the piece, really), on the ways in which his early middle age has touched upon that of fellow writer Nick Flynn.

Compline

¶ Sheril Kirshenbaum’s initially dismaying account of sexual harrassment at Duke University goes on, thank goodness, to remind us that the struggle for gender equality and the dismantling of male patriarchy are top priorities. (The Intersection)

Have A Look

¶ Clothes on Film (via MetaFilter)

¶ “Don’t Forget to Smile When You Serve Cold Drinks.” (via The Rumpus)

The next edition of The Daily Office will appear on Tuesday, 7 September 2010.

Morning Snip: See Him Out

RJK — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 14:00:36 +0000

HRH Prince Charles recycles.

“Someone has been imaginative enough to make cuff links out of the previous engine from my 40-year-old Aston Martin and to sell them in aid of my trust for young people. “I even have shoes made from leather salvaged from an 18th century wreck. They are totally indestructible and will see me out,” the Prince wrote. The shoes were made in 1987 from leather recovered from a Danish brigantine, which sank off Plymouth in 1786. Its cargo of hides was discovered by divers in 1973. Charles , who as Duke of Cornwall was the owner of the wreck and its contents, allowed the divers to sell the hides to finance the salvage operation. In return, he was given the first pair of leather shoes.

(via Good)

Daily Office: Thursday, 2 September 2010

RJK — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 03:59:32 +0000

Matins

¶ Just in case you were taking consciousness for granted: Daniel Dennett has called it “the last surviving mystery,” and a glance at the Quantum Consciousness theory of Roger Penrose and Stuart Hamerhoff may leave you un-demystified. (Big Think; via 3 Quarks Daily)

Lauds

¶ At the Guardian, Alistair Smith casts a spotlight on the boom in cruise ship theatre productions. (via Marginal Revolution)

Prime

¶ Although he writes as though that detox tea that he has been drinking has fermented, possibly, what we like about Philip’s gaze into the future of economics is the idea that we’re still missing some very important pieces of the puzzle — that is, we don’t know what we’re doing. (Weakonomics)

Tierce

¶ Intensive analysis of Sudanese bones dating from (roughly) the late Roman Empire reveals tetracycline saturation, leading scientiest to infer that not only that the local beer was antibiotic but that the brewers knew what they were doing. Jess McNally reports, in Wired Science.

Sext

¶ It’s that kind of day: we’re in deep sympathy with The Awl‘s Alex Balk, who fell into the WikiHole of a quest for the truth about Ellen Pompeo’s polydactylism. (And Ellen Pompeo would be — ? Oh.)

Nones

¶ Dexter Filkins reports on the run on Kabul Bank, brought by cronyism to the brink of collapse. (NYT)

Vespers

¶ Scott Esposito applies Clay Shirky’s distinction between writers and authors to The Shallows, and concludes that Nicholas Carr is the first but not the second. It’s ironic, in a sour sort of way, that a book bemoaning the deleterious effects of the Internet should betray infection by them. (Conversational Reading)

Compline

¶ Chinese rock — how’s that for an oxymoron? “This is not a society of rebels.” The Telegraph‘s Malcolm More chats with impresario Archie Hamilton.

Have A Look

¶ “Fightin’ iRish: Notre Dame Class Switches to iPads.” (Good)

¶ secondome. (Design Sponge)

Morning Snip: Jealousy, Fading

RJK — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 14:00:15 +0000

Eric endeavors to take a scientific view of jealousy (not a current affliction, thank goodness), but does not quite succeed.

I thought of my own experiences with jealousy. I had been extremely jealous in my first relationship. I was constantly suspecting my boyfriend of infidelity and constructing heartbreaking scenarios in my mind. In later relationships, the level of jealousy declined dramatically and precipitously.

Could this be because my body senses that, by now, a sufficient amount of genetic material must have found its way into the creation of some new entities that will be able to carry on my genetic legacy?

I had assumed that it could be explained by how, in my first relationship, I felt like I had found something that I had been waiting for for my entire life. It was so special and so wonderful, I was terrified to lose it. So the idea of anything threatening to take my boyfriend away from me sent me into a hysterical state. Since our relationship had begun with a kiss, a kiss with another seemed like it might be the beginning of my end.

Now, many years later and with plenty of experience with heartache, I know that I will probably be able to rebuild myself after being brutally demolished, and I am also a better judge of what constitutes a true threat to the relationship. So, consequently, I am less jealous.

Daily Office: Wednesday, 1 September 2010

RJK — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 03:59:32 +0000

Matins

¶ Only yesterday, we heard for the first time of Mike Rose, whose books about intelligence and education (and the disconnect between them) promise to appear in our reading pile PDQ; now, today, we encounter a blog about apparel manufactoring in particular and the “sustainable factory floor” in particular, Kathleen Fasanella’s Fashion-Incubator. Adverted to this Web log for designer entrepreneurs by the tirely Tyler Cowen, we fastened with great interest on this discussion of the alarming and fundamentally bogus split between “knowledge workers” and worker workers. Complete with references to Mike Rose!

Lauds

¶ Nige responds to the news that Kazuo Ishiguro’s best-known novel, The Remains of the Day, is being adapted for the musical theatre. We are in complete accord with his dismay.

Prime

¶ In a wittily-titled entry, “Legends of the Fall,” Joshua Brown deconstructs the swarm of financial pieces that presume to posit seasonal doom based on historical indicators &c. Eyewash, cries Mr Brown. What he says for investors goes for us onlookers as well.

Tierce

¶ Here’s a story to chill if not kill the idea that natural ills can be vanquished with genuine once-and-for-all finality. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, the cessation of smallpox vaccination 20 years ago opened the door to monkeypox — a not unforeseen development. If you want to see what monkeypox looks like, click here. (Not Exactly Rocket Science)

Sext

¶ New boy in town, “sleight of mind” artist Matthew Michael Cooper makes a big boo-boo mistake (from which he is not shielded by interviewer or editor, and in response to a question out of left field), but he responds well to correction in the comments. New York makes people better people!

Nones

¶ Once upon a time, colonial powers would have dreamed of doing what China is doing, in the way of running railroads into Southeast Asia. China, which still calls itself the Central Nation, is probably untroubled by Western-style pricks of conscience. (China Post; via Real Clear Nation)

Vespers

¶ Lizzie Skurnick does a bang-up job of highlighting the comical parallels — sure to be savored no more richly than by the author himself — between the media hoo-ha already surrounding Freedom, the Jonathan Franzen book that came out, officially, only yesterday, and the awkward scrutiny that’s brought to bear on the novel’s characters, all of them “frequently undone by how poorly their public selves match their private desires.”

Compline

¶ George Packer marks the end of Operation Iraqi Freedom, the mission that has achieved nothing in over seven years. (Interesting Times)

Have A Look

¶ Josh Barkey’s modest proposal for green high school students. Guys, that is. (Good)

¶ Jane Fonda, Juliette Lewis plug Scissor Sisters. (Joe.My.God.)

¶ Boring Conference 2010: Save the date! 11 December, “somewhere in London.”

Morning Snip: Someone Is Right on the Internet

RJK — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 14:00:05 +0000

At Big Questions Online, Alan Jacobs writes about an experience that thousands of thoughtful people have had on the Internet in these early days: becoming too angry to type. There is always only one immediate cure.

The author and commenters bristled at my critique. I bristled right back. The argument escalated. At one point, I said to myself, “All right, you want to play hardball, we’ll play hardball” — and I would have cut loose and said exactly what I wanted to say, except that at that moment my hands were shaking too violently for me to type accurately. I looked at my trembling fingers for a moment. Then I closed that browser tab and spent a few minutes removing all Anglican-related blogs from my bookmarks and my RSS reader. I stopped reading those blogs and have never looked at them again to this day. I don’t think I’ve ever made a better decision.

A now-famous cartoon on the xkcd “webcomics” site shows a stick figure typing away at his computer keyboard as a voice from outside the frame says, “Are you coming to bed?” The figure replies: “I can’t. This is important. . . . Someone is wrong on the Internet.” I have thought a lot about why people get so hostile online, and I have come to believe it is primarily because we live in a society with a hypertrophied sense of justice and an atrophied sense of humility and charity, to put the matter in terms of the classic virtues.

(via MetaFilter)

Daily Office: Tuesday, 31 August 2010

RJK — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 03:59:37 +0000

Matins

¶ Much as we liked James Surowiecki’s column in this week’s New Yorker, “Are You Being Served?,” we wish that it were a tad more penetrating.

It seems pretty clear to us that “most companies have a split personality when it comes to” human beings. And this is only natural: the modern company, boosted by the extraordinary leaps in productivity that were realized by the Industrial Revolution, has always sought to employ as few human beings as possible. It is for the machines to do the work; in an ideal world, machines can run the factory as well. And who were the customers of large companies? Other companies. It is difficult to imagine, but until the Second World War, the different kinds of mass produced goods intended for the general public could all be sold through a few catalogues and some not-very-large stores.

“The Consumer Society” has been, by and large, a nighmare for the modern company. And, in the everlasting fashion of modern companies, it has simply passed on the headache of that nightmare (the cost of doing business) to customers and employees alike.

Lauds

¶ Anisse Gross begins her interview with the incredible kinetic sculptor Arthur Ganson with what might be the stickiest question that one could ask: what distinguishes Ganson’s constructions from amusing toys? Be sure sure to click through to The Rumpus and enjoy the YouTube clips of Ganson’s art.

Prime

¶ At Baseline Scenario, guest Ilya Podolyako outlines the improvidence of relying, as the Dodd-Frank Act does, upon clearing houses to stabilize the market in derivatives. Don’t say you weren’t warned.

Tierce

¶ In case you’re bothered this evening by a grouch who believes that we’re all going to hell in a handbasket &c, you might consider passing on this bit of news: archeologists working in Turkey have discovered evidence of “successful” brain surgery (ie, it didn’t kill the patient) among reamins of a Bronze Age settlement. No evidence of Bronze Age anesthetics is mentioned. (New Scientist)

Sext

¶ Having mistaken Elif Batuman, author of the wildly popular lit crit romp, The Possessed, to be a person of the masculine gender, Ujala Sehgal, our favorite Millions intern, attempts to make amends. As penance, the author suggests that she buy the book.

Nones

¶ Was anybody else surprised by the absence, from Steve Coll’s Pakistan piece in this week’s Talk of the Town, of the word “feudal“? It’s true that we’ve felt a bit wild throwing “feudal” around in our discussions of the broken rump of the Raj — or did, that is, until we read Sabrina Tavernise’s story in Saturday’s Times, “Upstarts Chip Away at Power of Pakistani Elite.”

Vespers

¶ At Good, Mark Peters laments the perverse misusage of the term “Orwellian” — “It’s as if we called criminal scum “Batmanistic” because Batman is so effective in beating them senseless” — but acknowledges that the pigs are out of the barn.

Compline

¶ It goes without saying that we had to read anything with a title as wrong-headed as this: “Urban Legends: Why suburbs, not cities, are the answer.” The further we got in Joel Kotkin’s piece, however, the righter it all seemed, provided that we understood it to be about the deleterious impact of unnecessarily large business organizations, not that of population densities. Cities don’t produce poverty. Mr Kotkin reverses his cause and its effect. (Foreign Policy: via Real Clear World)

Have A Look

¶ Ted Wilson, housesitting, kills the neighbors’ dog. (The Rumpus)

¶ Ask for directions and save thousands. (Good)

¶ Linda “Lovelace” declines to provide an autograph, but sort of does so, anyway. Good for her. (Letters of Note)

Morning Snip: Days From Death

RJK — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 14:00:33 +0000

Double Dangler: “Days from death, Fla. wildlife officials free plastic jar that was stuck on bear cub’s head.” At Language Log, Geoffrey Pullum pretends to scratch his head:

Who was just days from death? Well, this is a headline, so we have no prior context, so we don’t initially know. But we see that someone is days from death, and the comma tells us that this is an adjunct introducing a clause that is almost certainly going to tell us, so we read on, and we hit the main clause subject: Florida wildlife officials. We are all mortal, and some day every Florida wildlife official must prepare to meet the Creator of all wildlife, so it is the most natural thing in the world to take them as the target of predication that we need, and we fill it in: we understand (for a split second) that some Florida wildlife officials were just days from death. So now, what did they do?

And at that point we learn that they freed a plastic jar. Even though they were dying. The story is getting stranger and stranger. Next we learn that the jar was freed from the embarrassing predicament of being stuck on a young bear’s head. Still not a lot of sense to any of it. But we read on, and finally we encounter the explanatory sentence: “Biologists say the cub was days away from death because the jar made it impossible to eat or drink.” OK, puzzlement over. The cub was just days from death, the jar was on the cub’s head, the wildlife officials are fine, they freed the cub from its jar-imprisonment by freeing the jar from its bear-attachment, everything is now clear.

(via Felix Salmon)

Daily Office: Monday, 30 August 2010

RJK — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 03:59:43 +0000

Matins

¶ What’s this? Golf courses promote biodiversity? In England, it appears, a study that looked at over two hundred links found that a large majority were as ecologically beneficial as parks and preserves. The bottom line is, as usual, that we didn’t know as much as we thought we did. (via The Awl)

Lauds

¶ Although we’re still enthusiastic about going to the movies, we agree with Bob Lefsetz, writing at The Rumpus, that “If you truly want to succeed in the entertainment industry today, if you want to have a long career, you’ve got to think small.”

Prime

¶ At Weakonomics, Philip offers one of those contrarian, too-good-to-be-true solutions to an everyday problem — pet animal overpopulation, in this case — that really ought to be put to the test right away.

Tierce

¶ Jonah Lehrer writes about that most Proustian of science topics, time and memory. Why does time seem to slow down in a crisis? (The Frontal Cortex)

Sext

¶ From a site that we’ve begun following: I Like Boring Things. What to do when a conference called “Interesting” is canceled? There’s something almost daring about hosting a deliberately Boring Conference — considering all the inadvertent ones.

Nones

¶ William James week at The Second Pass — last week marked the centenary of the philosopher’s death — has been extended a bit, to accommodate a guest post by James biographer Robert Richardson, who writes about James’s interest in finding a “moral equivalent of war.”

Vespers

¶ Sonya Chung is re-reading The Great Gatsby — she’s going to be teaching it. Among the thoughts that a third reading has occasioned, the most intriguing, if somewhat irrelevant is that in Heath Ledger we lost an actor who might truly have realized the strange Mr Gatz. Her more classroom-appropriate observations are, even so, fresh and astute. (The Millions)

Compline

¶ In an interview with Salon‘s Alex Jung, labor lawyer Thomas Geoghegan makes some interesting points about the difficulty of comparing productivity in the US and in Germany. (via 3 Quarks Daily)

Have A Look

¶ Garland Grey’s bullet-pointed Bildungsroman. (The Bygone Bureau)

¶ Truffle hunting in Northern Italy has claimed seventeen lives this season. (Independent; via reddit)