Archive for June 2009

The monthlies.

• Duplicity

  Duplicity at its finest… Modoc has the highest Republican registration of any county in California, it unfailingly elects anti-tax Republicans to office, and the vote here against last month’s ballot measure that would have raised a variety of taxes was one of the most lopsided in the state. And yet, per capita, Modoc County gets [...]

• Currently Reading

  Looking through my bookshelf, I’ve discovered all I have left really are heady books.1 I’ve been purchasing books at a quicker pace the last few months on Amazon to build up some sort of a backlog, and none of them are “quick reads” so to speak. I have always had an interest in what happened [...]

• Ruminating on the Great War and Subsequent Failed Peace

  What to say of Paris 1919. It was truly remarkable to learn of such a consequential and ultimately fatal document. Without getting too professorial,1 this is what went wrong… The Germans were not thoroughly defeated in the war. Following the armistice in November, the German armies were greeted as victors in the cities, complete with [...]

• True Marketing

  This is a great bit of marketing on packets of hot cocoa… As much calcium as a glass of milk. (Just add milk.) The only thing that compares, in my feeble mind, is cholesterol-free vegetable oil. You wouldn’t say.

• Vanity Fair

  If this, er, TechCrunch report* is true, there is something horribly wrong with our society… “Needless to say, a lot of people were left in the dust, forced to settle for something other than the [Facebook] vanity URL they’d been dreaming of for weeks.” * Sometimes I cannot help myself. I’m still reading the Huffington [...]

• White Elephants

  Live, right now, on NBC in the bay area: SF Giants vs. Oakland A’s, played in Oakland. By rule, er, by law, all games of the bay series should be played in San Francisco and their beautiful waterside ballpark, AT&T Park (formerly and still locally known as Pac Bell Park), not simply for the sake [...]

• California Parks, Use Fees, and Cost-Neutrality*

  Although the state of California is the seventh- or tenth-largest economy in the world, depending on when and what measure you read, and therefore the most important economy within the United States, and although the federal government has rescued investment banks, insurance companies and car manufacturers, as a result of behavior that all parties have [...]

• Qwitter

  Am I ashamed to quit Twitter? No, not really; it just wasn’t my thing. To effectively use my analogy, I walked into the bar, heard the conversation, and decided that the conversation was lame. (Well, the conversation was not lame; the bar was. The conversation didn’t help.) No offense to those “talking,” but the idea [...]

• First Come, First Served

  The A’s have tried almost everything. They offer $2 tickets on Wednesdays (along with $1 hot dogs, although they are not regular-sized hot dogs; I also believe there is a limit of 10 per person per transaction). They have an all-you-can-eat section (a true-blue value of $35). But still their seats remain empty, thousands of [...]

• More Doctors Smoke Camel

  In honor of the looming anti-smoking bill…

• Cheney’s Trauma

  Also while I was away, Dick Clarke penned an op-ed, criticizing the excuses being laid down (loudly and all too often) by Dick Cheney… Yes, Dick Cheney and Condoleezza Rice may have been surprised by the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 — but it was because they had not listened. And their surprise led them [...]

• ReLax

  While I was away, Syracuse repeated as national champions, in historic fashion…

• On Why I Left Facebook

  I’ve probably hinted at why I’ve left Facebook, at some point or another, but to needlessly go in length on such an inane and insubstantial topic, just because I can, here goes (and what better forum than a grade-a blog)… Simply, it is a waste of time. I was having drinks with a land developer [...]

• Calling In Sick

  A few years ago I ran a beer-league softball team. We were not that good, and the team no longer exists (but it may regenerate at some point, I guess). We had a few early weekend practices scheduled, and a good friend of mine decided to call-in sick for one of them (I don’t think [...]

• No trumpets allowed.

  This is one of my favorite pictures from Krakow, taken aboard a streetcar…

• Krakow

  We spent four days and five nights in Krakow. (Yes, that combination is possible. We arrived very late on a Friday, following more than twenty-four hours of consecutive travel, and left in the morning four days later.) Krakow is very beautiful, easily up there with what Paris and Barcelona have to offer. Speaking of Paris. [...]