I am overwhelmed with lassitude and unblogginess today. I can't seem to get excited about writing about any of the things I thought interesting today. So, instead, I choose to meander. You are welcome to tag along, if you wish, but only if you would wear a scooby-doo band aid to work. I require that you be prepared to exhibit that level of not taking yourself too seriously today to go any farther. Ok?

*First, the text of a movie review from the NY Times today:

Another neglected Eurotrash classic resurrected - in an extremely good print - by Mondo Macabro DVD, "Girl Slaves of Morgana Le Fay" is a 1971 French softcore sex and horror film that might have been directed by Jacques Rivette and written by Jean Cocteau. Obliquely based on the legend of King Arthur's half-sister, the sorceress, the picture takes place almost entirely within a remote chateau, where Morgana (Dominique Delpierre), employs her ancient wiles to recruit a young tourist (Mireille Saunin) into the ranks of her female love slaves, all gifted with immortality. To keep things lively, Morgana's court also includes a psychotic dwarf (Alfred Baillou) with an excessive fondness for eyeliner and a lust for revenge.

Despite the ultra low budget, and the apparent inability of the cameraman to create a single atmospheric shot, the film - the first to be directed by Bruno Gantillon - develops a real sense of mystery and fantasy, chiefly through a theatrical stylization of movement and dialogue (choral forms predominate) that casts a spell not unlike Mr. Rivette's celebrated "Céline and Julie Go Boating," which "Morgana" predates by three years. A genuine curiosity, presented here with appropriate respect and illuminating supplementary material, including Mr. Gantillon's short film "An Artistic Couple." $19.95. Not rated.

As one of my co-workers astutely points out: lesbian love slaves and dwarves, how can you go wrong? Indeed.

And how cool a job does the reviewer have, huh?

*Second, it seems like summer is slipping away, taking with it half memories and full truths of summers past: sticking to the faux-leather seats in my dad's Oldsmobile, cooled only by the breeze from the windows; sand in places sand should not comfortably be; smelling like sun tan oil; eating anything by the sea because it is a truism that food consumed next to salt water simply tastes better; children kissed golden brown by the sun; the Girl Child demonstrating the cannon ball; the Girl Child learning how to swim and throwing herself into the big kids' pool, totally without any fear, to demonstrate her new skills; the Boy Child throwing up his hand and yelling "MEG!" (pronounced "my") when asked who was going to the Kiddy Pool or to the "Beak" (his word for beach); the feeling that your whole life still stretches in front of you as the days become longer and the sunlight keeps coming, long into the evening; the sailboats tacking back and forth as they race on the Sound, looking sleek and purposeful; the explosion of the fried clam belly in your mouth with all of its richness, so powerful as to almost be too much, although you finish the whole order anyway; the taste of that cold, cold beer that somehow never tastes the same, never seems quite so necessary in February; summer's happiest tomatoes (need I say more?); and, finally, the bittersweet realization that the beach toys are soon to be packed away, the life guards gone back to school, and the days grown shorter, until all I have left are these thoughts.

*I don't really get the whole Cindy Sheehan thing. At first, I have to say, I thought it just fine that she wanted to meet with the President, sort of in the grand tradition of common citizens meeting with Lincoln at the height of the Civil War. But now, I have come to think her a lightning rod for fools, a rallying point for the wacky left and the ugly right, a place where people who hate America can come together and find common ground. It never ceases to amaze me how much the extreme left and the extreme right have in common. I just wish David Duke and Al Sharpton had been visiting Ms. Sheehan on the same day. That would have been gorgeous to see. Either way, we contain multitudes, this nation of ours. Welcome to the tumult.

*I wonder, sometimes, about why I continue to blog. I donÂ’t have an answer. Until I come up with one, I will, like the milkmanÂ’s horse, keep coming back here almost every day and continue to write. Do you know which post of mine takes the most comments? Easily, without comparison, its the one on Welsh hip hop. Click on the category page for that topic and marvel at how alive that music scene is.

*My Gmail seems to be down. Thank goodness. Jim and I have been torturing each other with School House Rock songs, throwing snatches of lyrics at each other. With my email down, that gives me last word.

Posted by: Random Penseur at 03:42 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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The week, thankfully, is drawing to a close. It was a miserable week, by and large. I am not sorry to see it go, no matter how spendthrift that makes me seem with the small amount of time granted to me on this earth. I'm happy to pretend that this week was no different from trying to hold water in my hands, that the week had to drain away no matter what I did. That's the good thing about time, right? That it wounds all heels, or something?

Still, the week has ended / is ending on a positive note and I shall reflect on the highlights here:

*Thank you all for the very kind comments you left and for the private emails you sent me. It was an unlooked for, unexpected kindness, the best kind really.

*Dinner with Simon was really a bright spot. We happily chatted away for 3+ hours and I think it could have been more if I didn't have to catch a train.

*I will note that most weeks generally will not include a trip to the dentist among a list of highlights but this was not most weeks. Being out of the office was just grand. No matter how much discomfort.

*I already had a screening interview for a new job here in NYC. Keeping my fingers crossed. The interview went smashingly well, so we'll just have to see. If it works out, it will mean a career change. That sounds very nice at this point in time. Very nice.

*Just the same, I had a new client come in today for a preliminary consultation. A young guy, younger than me, but successful. Sounds like a nifty little case and one I'd enjoy doing. I'll quote him a fee on Monday and see if he wants to retain me. When I say little, I don't mean to demean him or his 7 figure plus problem, I just mean that it felt very self-contained. But I already see a couple of places where I could change that, change the dynamic of the interactions he's had with the defendants and maybe blow things up a bit. Like starting with disqualifying the defendants' law firm. That always upsets people.

*My kids were flat out joys to be around this week. No qualification possible. I may have the cutest kids in the whole world. Last night, I read "The Enormous Crocodile", by Roald Dahl, to the Girl Child. Couldn't help myself at the end, when Trunky the Elephant is swinging the Enormous Croc around and the Croc says, "Let me go!", from then saying/singing: "I will not let you go . .Let me go. . .I will not let you go. . .Let me go". Shameless, I am. After the reading, the Boy Child crawled up onto the Girl Child's bed and, at the invitation of the Girl Child, lay his little curly blond head on her lap so she could stroke his hair and forehead. He looked up at her and told her that he loved her. I wanted to cry. It was that beautiful, that perfect. Makes all the work stuff seem trivial.

*I got another expression of interest from another head hunter about some in house compliance positions. May not go anywhere at all, but you know what? It don't got to go no where. See, what it is, is hope. Hope is a powerful and uplifting emotion. It can pull you out of the dumps, let you lift your head up and contemplate the horizon a little. Once you see the horizon, you know that the shitty place you may be in at the moment can and will be a memory. Hope lets you imagine a different future and when your present doesn't amuse, a different future is a wonderful thing to be able to muse about. So, I'm enjoying my little shot of hope. I'm even a bit buzzed on it, truth be told. I can see myself in that future and, even if it turns out to suck, it least it would be a different kind of suck. Right?

*Another high point may be that these horrible peasant skirts which are all the rage this summer could be reaching their natural end. I have yet to see a woman look good in a peasant skirt. Really. I wish the fashion industry would stop being run by people who hate women.

I'll leave you with this, which a friend sent me. Seems appropriate:

Posted by: Random Penseur at 02:55 PM | Comments (11) | Add Comment
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I have to say that I really enjoy shopping for suits. It is a hugely tactile experience for me. I almost close my eyes and walk down the rack for my size and run my fingers along the suits, stopping only when I hit some fabric that feels especially fine. Then and only then do I look at the suit and the pattern. In the first instance, its all about the material, baby. Its gotta be wool and its gotta feel good. Don't let someone tell you that there isn't a difference between suit manufacturers or that all the suits are the same or that wool is wool. Wool is most certainly not just wool. Really.

Today, I went to my favorite store. Don't ask for the name, they're doing just fine without my plug and I don't want to have to fight to get in there, ok? It is not a street level men's store and they don't rely on walk in customers. In fact, I don't even think that there's a sign in the lobby. And when you get to the door, you have to be buzzed in. At least you don't have to knock three times first.

I went because I needed a new tuxedo. I have lost a bit of weight and my old one cannot be taken in as much as it needs to be taken in. I looked like a kid playing dress up in his father's clothes when I tried it on. Also, I realized, looking at my calendar, that I am going to be wearing black tie at least six times between September 1 and December 31. So, I bought one and, like with any suit, I chose between two models and picked the one with the better feeling wool.

What did I get, you may ask? Or maybe you don't care. Well, I'm gonna tell you anyway, so there.

I bought a beautiful Hickey Freeman tuxedo for about 60% off. See, the fabric has to feel good but the deal has to also feel good. Welcome to NY. The deal has to be there. Only suckers pay retail in NY. Or really rich people. I know I'm not rich and I like to think I am not a sucker, or at least rarely. Hickey Freeman makes beautiful, exceptionally constructed suits out of gorgeous materials. The only better off the rack suit is Oxxford and I cannot afford them, even on sale.

The tuxedo has a shawl collar. This is not something you see so often but I am enough of a clothes horse to want one. With a shawl collar you don't look like you are either wearing just a black suit or are part of the catering staff.

It looks like this:

Something about the shape and drape of the collar and the whole jacket just feels like a throw back to the 1920's and 1930's. Just something very elegant about the look and the statement it makes. Another nice thing about it is that you do not look like everybody else when wearing a shawl collar. Subtly, you stand out a bit. And that's not at all a bad thing, it seems to me.

Now, I just have to talk my wife into letting me go back and get some new suits. They're having a sale and the fabrics were to die for, as my grandmother used to say.

Posted by: Random Penseur at 02:56 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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I do that sometimes. Hell, everyone does that sometimes. The internet makes it easy. You sit at your desk and you click through possible job openings in related fields and, with a click of a button, you apply for jobs in Salt Lake City and Los Angeles and Chicago. All places you don't really want to live in, mind you, but they kind of have to be far away to qualify for other life status. A move to a far away place is an integral requirement for this out of current life fantasy.

Or you think, gee, what happens if the money actually comes in from whatever (inheritance, some big case, lottery, or that old mine you bought so many years ago when the price of that mineral was at next to nothing), where would you move to? And you click on real estate listings in whatever city catches your interest at that particular moment.

Today, that was New Orleans, the city of some of my mis-spent youth. I played around with the real estate listings, knowing all the while that I would really have to be out of my head completely if I decided to ever move back there or own property there. Seriously, all the mature indicia augur against any such decision. In short, it would be stupid.

But then you allow the domestic architecture to seduce you. You realize you could own a 130 year old house with a staircase that looks like this:

And you think to yourself, maybe it wouldn't be so bad living back down there. I mean, that house is gorgeous, isn't it?

I have never lived in a city as house proud as New Orleans. I used to love, just love, driving around and looking. To my great fortune, I was friends with some very socially prominent people down there and thus invited into some of the grander houses for Mardi Gras house parties. To see these houses was a real privilege.

I miss the houses. I miss the city. I seriously doubt I could ever live there again, no matter how much I want to fantasize about it.

My wife is so patient with me when I get like this. IÂ’m a lucky guy.

Still, that wanderlust is rising. . .

Posted by: Random Penseur at 04:03 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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Background

It was around 4:00 yesterday afternoon. The kids were napping, I was updating security software on the laptop, the Yankees game was on mute on the television, the a/c was humming away quietly, and classical music was playing on the radio. Then the storm hit and it hit with a fury. Lightening flashing, thunder booming, and the rain coming down fast and heavy, driven against the house by the wind.

*POP* Out go the lights, out goes everything powered by electricity. Everything. Including the sump pumps in the basement, it just occurred to me. Gotta check that tonight. Oh, well. Hopefully that will be ok.

The kids were still napping but when they woke up, just like that, they were knocked out of our century. We lit the house with candles in whatever rooms we were in -- none of the candles were left unattended. Too scary a thought. My wife ordered pizza in for dinner and after dinner we all played on the floor of the den and then all over the house. The kids were tumbling over each other like puppies. It was adorable. And the house looked pretty nice in the candle light. It was an interesting exercise, a throwback to times past.

Connecticut was hit pretty hard by this storm. The mayor of Stamford compared it to some horrible ice storm in the 1930's.

And we were totally unprepared. Well, not totally. We did have flashlights and candles, canned food and cell phones, bottled water and other things. But, we were fortunate in that we just happened to have this stuff from prior storms and prior incidents. We've done very little in the way of major storm planning.

So, I'm going to do that here and invite comments. I am fortunate in having somehow attracted some terribly smart people to my blog (why, I have no idea) and I'm going to take advantage of it now and ask for your thoughts on disaster planning.

The Plan

*Enough flashlights for every person in the house
*Extra supply of fresh batteries
*Good battery powered radio
*First aid kit
*Figure out how to open garage door when power fails
*Make sure cars are gassed up in advance of major storm predicted
*Buy a couple of battery powered camping table lights
*Establish emergency supply of bottled water
*Get shelf stable milk in small packages for Boy Child
*Make sure to have several rolls of duct tape (hey, you never know)
*In advance of storm arrival, unplug all sensitive electronics
*In advance of storm arrival, turn fridge and freezer to coldest setting and move some of the ice packs from freezer into fridge.
*In advance of storm, make sure cell phones are charged.
*Keep emergency cash in the house.
*Post list of not commonly used phone numbers on door of fridge -- power company, water company, telephone company, etc.
*Make sure that there is a princess phone for use when power outage takes out wireless phone system.
*Make sure that you have enough shelf stable (i.e., canned or dried) food for at least three meals. More than that you ought to probably get out of the house, it seems to me.
*In advance of storm, run dishwasher to make sure you have clean dishes and place for dirty ones.

*For winter, make sure that you have some wood to burn in the fireplace since the furnace will go out, according to the nice oil company lady I just spoke to. Are there viable battery operated heaters?

So, what do you all think? Missing anything important? Including anything silly?

Thanks, in advance, for your thoughts on this.

UPDATE:

Happily, after placing a call to the people who put in the sump pumps for the prior owners, I have learned that the sump pumps are on a back up battery system good for around 6700 gallons of water. I think that I will not have to worry about the basement. Which is nice.

Posted by: Random Penseur at 10:59 AM | Comments (23) | Add Comment
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1 Maybe throw in a few extra mecessities like flashlights and batteries for any nearby neighbors. That way, if you have forgotten anything that they might have, you could trade...or, of course, just accumulate some good karma.

Posted by: Jessica at August 15, 2005 11:12 AM (9wQUZ)

2 Take it from me, I learned the hard way. You need a generator for the sump pumps and when you run them they need to be outside not inside the house.

Posted by: Wicked H at August 15, 2005 11:24 AM (iqFar)

3 I've been through several earthquakes, plus a riot. I'd say overall that your list may be a little too complicated. I would move emergency cash to the top, along with the battery radio; some of the other stuff, like the camping light, can probably go. The suggestion about the generators is very good. It's possible to buy disaster kits; you can check at the store for what they include. I would also look at your appliances -- do you have any older ones on natural gas that need to have pilots re-lit? If so, you may want to get some very long matches to relight same, and possibly bone up on the procedures. You won't get utility response soon after a disaster.

Posted by: John Bruce at August 15, 2005 11:35 AM (bdQSO)

4 Goodness, it's like one of those disaster movies from the 70's. Just relax, it'll be ok. If you do need to plan, all you need is a cell phone, some beer and Oreos (fruit juice and sandwich materials for the kids). It's good to have flashlights, etc around, and I always keep some bottled water available. Think about it this way-if you had been prepared with the flashlights and the Coleman camping stove, etc...wouldn't you have missed as wonderful an evening as it sounded like you had? I'm just saying. I do keep flashlights on hand, but I also know when electricity has handed me a blessing by cutting off and offering me a book and some candlelight

Posted by: Helen at August 15, 2005 11:46 AM (ATx6T)

5 PS-it's worth noting that I have been in every kind of disaster known to man, with the exception of a house fire (knock on wood). Earthquake, tornadoes, hurricanes, blizzards, wind storms, a riot, electrical storms, and yes-one volcano eruption. "Roll with the punches" is something I understand.

Posted by: Helen at August 15, 2005 11:48 AM (ATx6T)

6 Walkie talkies. Camping stove. Anything that can keep you dry and warm. Matches. Extra newspaper to start the fire. Pencil/pen and paper in a reliable place. That's all I got for now...will keep thinking.

Posted by: CJ at August 15, 2005 02:09 PM (0yCni)

7 Ummm, a couple of days worth of bottled drinking water. I lived through the 500 year flood twelve years ago in Iowa. The water works for the entire city was flooded and there was no potable water for weeks for a quarter million people. And I mean weeks. In case something similar happens, you'll want bottled water on hand because a. all the stores will sell out very quickly and b. it generally takes days for the stores to be reloaded and the National Guard can help only so many people, eh? I would also highly recommend duct tape and a pair of wellies, just in case you have to go through sludge.

Posted by: Kathy at August 15, 2005 03:54 PM (QKvIa)

8 Fill the tub--sometimes the water system will go down & you'll be glad you have it to help flush the toilets (learned the hard way through Hurricane Andrew). If you have enough warning, fill up a cooler or two with ice.

Posted by: Phyllis at August 15, 2005 04:48 PM (NFind)

9 Carry a cigarette lighter in your pocket. It's great to have flashlights and candles; it's not so great to bump into half of the walls and furnituyre while you feel your way around for them. You can't keep a lighter burning, though, so you **click**, take a few steps, let it go out and wait a few seconds (maybe blow on it to cool it), repeat until you've got your hands on a flashlight. Learned that the hard way. I've got candles in my room, but definately need the lighter to find them.

Posted by: Tuning Spork at August 15, 2005 07:11 PM (wJRvr)

10 cash. my sister got stuck in the south bronx with almost no gas...and no cash on 9/11. this day and age i never really carry any...well - i do now.

Posted by: sn at August 15, 2005 08:50 PM (cHOGW)

11 You didn't mention any sort of first aid kit. At the very least, you should have several days worth of any prescription meds your family might need.

Posted by: owlish at August 15, 2005 10:25 PM (kVnh2)

12 When we were iced into our house in Nashville without electricity for a solid week, we used our cast iron dutch oven stove from my great great grandmother (probablu from the early 1900s or so) to make stews using the coals in our fireplace. Nothing high tech, and we used alot of the dry goods we had on hand for it. When we got tired of that, though, we ate cold pop tarts.

Posted by: Mandalei at August 16, 2005 10:12 AM (+eH+G)

13 Move?

Posted by: GrammarQueen at August 16, 2005 01:24 PM (glf8i)

14 Champagne ........... always always have champagne.

Posted by: Mia at August 16, 2005 02:18 PM (B6Pag)

15 ohhhhh and maple syrup. Actually a few tins of condensed (sweet) milk would be a good idea.

Posted by: Mia at August 16, 2005 02:20 PM (B6Pag)

16 I agree with the above- Cash, flashlights, candles, water... And T.P. A stock of paper cups and plates wouldn't hurt either. Thanks for the link!!

Posted by: Rob at August 16, 2005 02:23 PM (i3q83)

17 Comic books.

Posted by: Amy at August 16, 2005 03:22 PM (nUCsP)

18 One year at the beginning of hurricane season in Florida my husband came home from a trip and said, "Why did you buy C batteries?" I said, "Because batteries were on the Hurricane Preparedness List published in the newspaper." He said, "We don't have anything that takes C batteries."

Posted by: Amy at August 16, 2005 03:23 PM (nUCsP)

19 Slightly off subject, but this is the second time today someone has mentioned this storm. We happened to be in Westport on Sunday (stopping off at the in-laws). The storm was certainly intense for a little bit where we were, but nothing really out of the ordinary. The power never even flickered. Interesting.

Posted by: Robert the Llama Butcher at August 16, 2005 05:24 PM (IkTb7)

20 The only thing I can add to the impeccable advice above? A sense of humor. Always, always keep it on hand, and don't leave - or go - home without it.

Posted by: Jennifer at August 16, 2005 07:37 PM (DOcmJ)

21 If you're going to plan, plan for a bad one. More food, more water, more candles, more batteries. A week's worth of stable food at least, same for water, along with purification tabs to make extra water safe. Don't forget supplies for any pets you have. Axe or hatchet, and a good bow saw. Tarps. Rope, cord, twine, string, etc. It would be hard to keep too much rope. Chemical glow sticks for the kids instead of candles, for night lights and on stairs and such. Easier, safer, and conserves batteries. Someone gave an excellent idea above about filling the tub. Also fill any sinks. And if it looks really bad, any buckets, rinsed out milk jugs and pretty much anything else that'll hold water. Water is going to be the one thing that's absolutely necessary to survive. And if the municipal supply gets contaminated, it takes time to become safe again.

Posted by: Ted at August 17, 2005 12:30 PM (blNMI)

22 I love the part about running the dishwasher before a storm. Made me laugh. Paper, my man, paper plates, plastic utensils, paper cups. Industrial-sized trashbags for many reasons. Be sure wallets, purses, etc are where you can get them in a hurry in case you're running out the door.

Posted by: Howard at August 17, 2005 05:14 PM (u2JaN)

23 Brookstones sells the Ready Lite flashlight that requires no batteries. Although I couldn't find a link for you, I bought the all in one radio, cell phone charger, flashlight that is self-generating by winding a handle for a minute. I'll save a fortune in batteries. In my disaster kit is water purifying tablets, clorox and some medical supplies. Don't forget a manual can opener!

Posted by: Marie at August 18, 2005 09:50 AM (PQxWr)

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Well, since you all asked, here's the picture I took of the garage, filled with boxes after three straight days of unpacking.

Scary, huh?

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I was detained, last night, by evil companions (a good friend and my wife) and only managed 5 hours of sleep. That's ok, all you need is five hours if you then go and mortify the flesh in the gym for about two hours. Indeed, that's also a good way to make walking later too painful to do much of. But back to last night.

I went with a dear friend who is an international expert on rare books and manuscripts and toured some of the highlights of a private book and manuscript collection at a private club here in New York City. Seeing and handling rare books is a pretty interesting experience. I don't have the rare book bug, although I probably could catch it if I let myself. Its just that I lack the time, the money, and the education. I have the inclination, at least mildly, but the inclination by itself will not a collection build. Which is good. Collections are a responsibility and I'm never really certain who owns whom. Does the collector own the collection or does the collection, which requires special care and storage and handling and security and professional care, own the collector?

This collection had some highlights and I was really very fortunate to be able to touch and admire the following:

*Mark Catesby's Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands (London 1771). Catesby predated Audubon and his drawings of birds and plants were so extraordinarily colorful, even after some 230 years and so lifelike. It was the first natural history of America. We didn't look at the fish, but maybe another time.

Catesby's Natural History of Carolina, Florida, & The Bahama Islands is one of the great achievements of Anglo-American science in the eighteenth- century. Catesby's great folio plates provided the means by which Europeans could view the natural produce of North American and thus were a part of the continuing discovery of the continent. Most of Catesby's figures were based on watercolor sketches that he made in the field or upon specimens made available to him in England. The work remained a major source for the study of American plants and animals through its own century and even into the next.

HereÂ’s one of his prints of the Teal (blue winged):

Regrettably, when his books come up for auction, they are often bought by dealers who cut them up and sell the prints individually. I think thatÂ’s cultural vandalism, personally.

*Ptolmey's Geographica (Venice 1511). This was one of the most interesting of the renaissance version of the atlas and while they corrected some of Ptolmey's mistakes, they couldn't bring themselves to correct all of them. Especially noteworthy is that this contained the first map that showed North America, or so I'm told. A nice link here. Here's the map. Love the little putti:

I think the thing that most blew me away with this printing was the title page. It was in red and in the form of an inverted pyramid, I assume in homage to Egypt. It was such a modern feeling graphical design presentation and the red was so beautiful. So exceptional.

*A couple of examples from the William Morris printing house, Kelmscott Press. These were rich, lush and detailed printings. Stunning stuff. You can see some examples here. A nice collection of information on Morris here. We then saw the 1903 printing of the Doves Bible by Cobden Sanderson, a protege of Morris, who rejected the rich and lush look for a much more sparse and very powerful look. Cobden Sanderson believed that the font stood for itself and should be powerful enough to support the work by itself. Here is the first page from the Doves Bible, one of the most famous pages in printing history, I'm told:

Pretty impressive, no?

*Leaving out some of the Renaissance era architectural books we looked at, at my request, we also looked at sketches and drawing by George Cruikshank, a noted satirist and caricaturist of the 1800's, in the tradition of Hogarth. The drawings were marvelous, a collection of full out water colors in exquisite detail all the way down to doodles he did, and signed, on the backs of envelopes and receipts for erasers. My favorite was a very powerful unfinished sketch for a series of illustrations for Milton's Paradise Lost. The edition was never published and Cruikshank destroyed the plates and the drawings, except for this one. It was quite a thrill to see it, to know that I was looking at something that existed nowhere else. Cruikshank also painted wonderful animals -- dogs and horses, in the best tradition of an English artist, it seems to me. The Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco has a large collection of his works and many of the images are online.

We finished off the visit with an hour long drink with the curator as we chatted about wonderful rare books he had seen in the course of his long career. A very real book nerd evening. After he left, we adjourned for dinner.

All in all, an outstanding night. It is really quite an experience to hold a book published in 1511. Makes one feel a little less important in the grand scheme of things, which may not be so bad at all in our very individual focused society.

Posted by: Random Penseur at 02:28 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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IÂ’ve been musing a bit about knowledge. How do we know what we know and why do we think we know it? IÂ’m sure that philosophers and just philosophy majors have spent years and years debating these questions and have honed them down into a manageable mess. I am not a philosopher and I did not major in philosophy. Nor, for that matter, have I read much philosophy, preferring to leave my mind uncluttered to better appreciate the simple pleasures of beer and baseball, preferably at the same time. So, I bring no baggage to these questions.

My musings were prompted by a book IÂ’m reading. My dad gave it to me, I threw it into my bag and forgot about it. It isnÂ’t heavy, so carting it around without remembering I had it for several months was no hardship. I found it this week when I went digging for my as of yet not located notary stamp. Damn that stamp. Anyway, the book, One Nation Under Therapy : How the Helping Culture is Eroding Self-Reliance , is interesting. One chapter in particular got my attention. The chapter on grief counseling and grief therapy.

Basically, the book asserts, the long held and widely held beliefs that you need therapy to deal with your grief, that you need to vent, to share your emotions and how you feel about your loss, is a bunch of hooey. The belief doesnÂ’t stand up to scientific review. In fact, for some, therapy simply prolongs the grief. The book notes that the 5 stages of grief that have become common cultural touchstones are in fact a distortion of the work of the shrink who came up with it. The 5 stages were not meant to apply to survivors but to people who had just been told that they had an incurable disease. Interesting, no? Pretty much anyone you ask will tell you (I know, over-generalization but, hey, its my blog) that grief and recovery from follow certain recognized pathways, right?

I paid particular attention to this because of the state my grandfather is in, you know.

Well, how is it that this is thought to be true if it isn’t? How do we “know” something? How can we be certain we know something?

We learn things by hearing them or by reading them. We rarely examine primary sources or conduct experiments ourselves. In fact, I think that for most things, we are probably three or four, at best, stages removed from the knowledge. The experiment is performed and the results are observed. Stage 1. The results are written up in a paper and presented somewhere. Stage 2. The results are then published in a journal. Maybe Stage 3 maybe just another stage 2. Then someone, maybe someone with no science training, writes an article about the report. Stage 4. That article is read or skimmed in the newspaper by the consumer. Stage 5. Public exposure of the article results in, maybe, a television appearance in which someone long removed from the experiment discusses the experiment and the results. Rarely is it the scientist. Stage 6. Maybe you’ve caught the 120 seconds of television airtime summarizing the article that summarized the report that summarized the experiment. And you become guided by it. Maybe you repeat what you think you’ve learned to your friends or co-workers, always with the authoritative phrase, “studies show” without really knowing that maybe it was just one experiment. Stage 7. And then we have public knowledge. Far removed, in 7 approximate stages, from the experiment and totally dumbed down.

That is how as best as I can figure out, knowledge becomes widely spread. At best, for most of us, we get our knowledge at Stage 4, the article. At worst, Stage 7. It doesnÂ’t have to mean that the knowledge we obtain is unreliable, but it doesnÂ’t bode well for a high reliability factor, does it, not when I break it down like this, right?

Sometimes we learn from school and from text books and from lectures from teachers or experts. Again, we are asked to accept the “knowledge” imparted in the book or from the lecture. We are asked to accept it as true. But we all know that information in this context is rarely complete and that information is often distorted by outside political forces. Take, for example, textbooks. Textbooks are often reviewed for “sensitivity” issues, for whether they may give offense to other cultures. In that regard, how can we ever accept, uncritically, anything that ever appears in a textbook, again, knowing that the contents have been, perhaps, distorted? Don’t believe me? Go forth and see what Diane Ravitch has said about some of these things (and then throw up):

*Diane on Math and

*Diane on Language Police.

So what can we do? I think that when you have the time, you should read and read critically the source material that an assertion claims to be premised upon. Grief counseling evidently rests on a very shaky foundation of science, or so the book claims in synthesizing the research of others. Don’t accept the bland “studies show” assertion. Go find out for yourself. Inform yourself, educate yourself, empower yourself.

But do it selectively. I mean, at some level, you have to trust or at least decide that the matter isnÂ’t important enough for you to spend the time researching and you might as well accept what you read. Reductio ab absurdum and you find yourself repeating NewtonÂ’s experiments on gravity or learning ancient Greek because you donÂ’t trust the Sophocles criticism you were reading. So, clearly, at some level, it canÂ’t be taken too far. I assume we all, intuitively, know what that level is. If not, good luck figuring it out.

Posted by: Random Penseur at 12:16 PM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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Comments, as I have noted before, are the best thing about blogging. Comments make it more like making love and less like intellectual masturbation.

I hit a milestone, yesterday, when Tuning Spork left me my 3000th comment since coming to MuNu. Wow. 3000 comments. I am really very grateful and a little bit overwhelmed by the number.

Rob said it the best on his blog, in referring to the people who comment on my blog:

You have, without a doubt- The best collection of "commenters" I have seen, bar none.

Rob is right. Y'all are the best! Thanks so much for making this worthwhile for me.

Posted by: Random Penseur at 10:34 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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1 Oh, no. Please, thank you!

Posted by: Wicked H at August 09, 2005 01:33 PM (iqFar)

2 Congrats, RP! Someday when I grow up, I too shall have a nifty batch of commenters. Even if I have to enlist all my personalities. *sigh* Now I have "commenter" envy. Great.

Posted by: Rob at August 09, 2005 01:48 PM (Gkhif)

3 You deserve the visits & comments, You deserve the high praise. The quality of your writing and your wit is what compels us to return.

Posted by: michele at August 09, 2005 07:39 PM (ZUSFz)

4 I think why RP gets such great comments is there's a lot of respect there. You will almost never see someone calling you names, or talking crap, because you don't put up with it and we/they know it. Plus your stories are great! Sometimes it's hard NOT to leave a comment.

Posted by: Oorgo at August 10, 2005 04:16 PM (lM0qs)

5 You have that knack for inviting conversation. I'm jealous.

Posted by: Ted at August 10, 2005 04:41 PM (+OVgL)

6 Um, Thanks, Rob??

Posted by: Mark at August 11, 2005 12:32 AM (Qy2ks)

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Christina, at Feisty Repartee, is hanging up her spurs. I will miss her sure handed and spare writing (never a wasted word), her clever insights, her penetrating observations, her sometimes heartrending stories and the terrific anecdotes of her way too smart children. Today, we lose one of the really great ones!

Thanks for the excellent writing and wonderful memories, Christina!

Posted by: Random Penseur at 05:09 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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1 Bless you for the very kind words, my friend; however, I shall be haunting you here. ; )

Posted by: Christina at August 08, 2005 05:55 PM (zJsUT)

2 NO-O-O-O-O-O-O-O!!!! I didn't visit often enough, but I also loved it when I did. This is a sad day in Munuvia.

Posted by: Tuning Spork at August 08, 2005 09:18 PM (ZgQJ1)

3 I've left my incredulity over there but I'll just add an "awshit" over here. *sniffle*

Posted by: Margi at August 09, 2005 02:39 AM (nwEQH)

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It was a quiet Sunday afternoon. The kids actually were napping, the wife was working out, the nanny was off at church, the air conditioning was humming away, we were as unpacked as we need to be at this stage of the weekend, and, for the first time in four days, I sat down for more than a moment.

But, I am a man and in some ways a typical man so I could not sit down in my new den without holding the remote. The adult male pacifier. And I could not hold it without using it, of course. But I did strike gold. Conan the Barbarian was only moments away from starting. I settled in to the couch to enjoy, as if for the first time again, the theatrical stylings of the Governator.

This brings me almost to the point of this post. Bet you thought I'd never get there, did you?

While watching this subtle play on the nature of good and evil, on choice and destiny, on nature v. nurture, I kept seeing breasts. There were a bunch of woman naked from the waist up in this cinematic tour de force. Normally, I suppose, I appreciate the naked female form as much as the next red blooded heterosexual male. But something about these breasts struck me as odd. And then it hit me. These breasts were real! That's why they looked so unusual and even, frankly, so nice.

And now we do get to the point. The point is this: real, not surgically enhanced breasts are seldom seen in movies today. They have vanished, much like cigarette adds from television. So much so, that I am wondering whether the natural breast should be added to the California endangered species list, Hollywood Chapter. They should not be allowed to vanish altogether. We should take a stand and demand their return to the big screen.

Seriously, how messed up is it that real breasts stand out on the screen? How many women have undergone cosmetic surgery to "improve" their looks for movies?

I'm reminded of a scene from a movie I can't recall the name of. Steve Martin and Sarah Jessica Parker are fooling around, in LA, and he says that her breasts feel weird and she says that's because they're real.

Could we start a grass roots movement here? Small breasts for the big screen! A rallying cry!

Posted by: Random Penseur at 09:53 AM | Comments (17) | Add Comment
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The movers came, the movers schlepped, the movers worked hard, they nicked walls, they damaged only one piece of furniture, and they left us with our boxes of possessions all over the house, mostly in the correct rooms.

We unpacked, to a minimum level of acceptability, our bedroom. We worked until late and then went out for -- margaritas. Well deserved re-hydration.

The next morning came with no hot water in the house. Someone had turned the furnace off, kindly meant, to not burn oil without the need. I turned the furnace back on and promptly it filled the furnace room with smoke and fumes. Service call one. The oil company. Hot water was restored, bodies were washed. Happiness returned. Ten hours of unpacking later, the kitchen was done. Kitchens take a lot of time to unpack. No question about it. In the meantime, deliveries came and went and our house became fuller still.

Friday, my father came to help. He made us a little bit crazy but he was a huge help. The kids' bedrooms were done and the den and living room were unpacked, the book shelves were adjusted, and the books were put away. Cable was hooked up so we had television again.

Saturday dawned with a trip to Stew Leonard's for pick up 1.5 lbs of jalapeno poppers. That's all we ended up eating for the whole day, as it turned out. The playroom was unpacked. The gym equipment was delivered and assembled by experts. We worked until the wee hours getting everything as finished as we could.

You should see the garage. In fact, I will take some pictures so you can see how we turned a spacious two car garage into a place where boxes were sent to die. My garage is the elephant graveyard of moving materials.

Sunday, the children came to their new home. I was promptly informed, and then regularly reminded by the Girl Child, that if it "was too hard" for her at the new house, her grandparents said she could move back with them.

Yesterday, first day back at the office and lots of catching up to do.

Today, too gruesome for words at work. Oh, and my wife has left us. You picked a fine time to leave me, Lucille! Jetted off to Cinncinnati. Business, she claims. But we all know what a garden of temptation Cinncinnati is. Who knows what she's doing there.

I told the Girl Child last week that when her mother went away, we could stay up late and do something fun, just the two of us. Last night, after I said good night and turned off her light, she said, "Pappa, I am sooo excited about tomorrow night!" Yay for me! I'm going to hold on to these moments as long as I can!

Another thing I'd like to hold on to? When I tell the Boy Child that I love him, in Norwegian, "Glad i deg!", his response back, "Goal die!" is too precious for me not to savor.

Finally, the kids are excited by the deer. They have seen the deer and like them. Me? I have seen the deer and concluded that, much as pigeons in the City are rats with wings, deer are rats with antlers and big ears.

More to come later.

Thanks for all the good wishes on the prior post! You all are the best!

Posted by: Random Penseur at 04:30 PM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
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