Ghosting and demon lovers
There’s a new way to break up with a significant other. It’s called “ghosting,” and essentially it involves disappearing from the person’s life suddenly and without explanation.
Continue reading →Category Archives: Literature and writing
Beyond Obamaphone
If you are a denizen of the blogosphere, you’ve probably already encountered the Obamaphone lady: I already knew about the program she’s referring to—which actually wasn’t started under Obama, by the way—so she didn’t seem quite as crazy as she … Continue reading →
Not-so-close encounters
An interesting bit of trivia: While at Eton, Eric Blair (future pen name, George Orwell) “was briefly taught French by Aldous Huxley.” England’s a small place, isn’t it? That wasn’t Orwell and Huxley’s only exchange. Huxley wrote to Orwell on … Continue reading →
HDR photography and seeing
Commenter “Harold” alerted me to a type of photography I’d never even heard of before, although I’d probably seen it and not known what I was looking at—HDR photography: High dynamic range imaging (HDRI or HDR) is a set of … Continue reading →
Big Brother CNN
I was at a doctor’s office today and had to sit in the waiting room for a few minutes, listening to the blah-blah-blah noise pollution of CNN. They were crowing about how terrible Romney is and how great Obama’s been … Continue reading →
Remember when?
Remember back to when the fatwa on Salman Rushdie seemed a strange and unfathomable aberration? Never such innocence again.
Continue reading →To allow comments or not to allow comments
Ann Althouse notes that Walter Russell Mead has closed comments on his blog with the following explanation: To make the comments section work in its present form we would have to edit and curate much more aggressively than we do … Continue reading →
One of Paul Ryan’s speechwriters…
…for his convention address was Matthew Scully, the same guy who wrote Sarah Palin’s acceptance speech at the 2008 Republican National Convention. If I ever need to make a speech, I think I just might call that guy. Scully is … Continue reading →
Early Castro: “it’s never going to taste the same”
I’ve just finished my latest book group assignment, Waiting For Snow in Havana, a memoir by Carlos Eire about his childhood in pre-Castro Cuba, the Castro takeover, and the circumstances under which he was able to leave Cuba for the … Continue reading →
Oooo, the poor plagarists, the pressure made them do it
I am getting really, really, really sick of this sort of excuse/explanation: “The problem [of plagiarism] is as old as journalism,” says Stephen Ward, director of the Center for Media Ethics at the University of Wisconsin. “It’s a systemic issue, … Continue reading →
Time, you old gipsy man
Five guys at the lake decide to recreate a photograph of themselves over and over, showing the passage of time [hat tip: Althouse].
Continue reading →Obama: “you didn’t build that”
I don’t ordinarily read the Chicago Tribune, and I don’t think I’ve ever heard of John Kass before, but this is one heckuva good column. I’m tempted to quote the whole thing, but I’ll just suggest you read it. In … Continue reading →