"Fear always springs from ignorance."—Emerson
|W|P|85105805|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comI was driving home from work today when I plowed into the side of another car. I was going east on Route 54, and she was pulling out of a gas station on the right, trying to turn left. She couldn't get out of the way, and I couldn't stop. I T-boned her perfectly—completely demolished the driver's side of her Civic. My Sentra looks surprisingly undamaged, although no one's taken a close look at it yet.
We're both okay, which is the most important thing. She admitted liability, and her insurance company says I can address this after Thanksgiving if I want. That's a relief—I was afraid we'd have to cancel the trip at the last minute. If we're lucky, we can drop the car off before we leave and pick it up when we come back.
The funny thing was, I thought I recognized the other driver. As we were talking I realized she's our vet! She remembered the cats and everything, even recommended some good vets in northern Raleigh, where we'll move soon. Even weirder, an assistant from her office will be taking care of the cats while we're gone. Strange coincidence.
|W|P|85080275|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons."—Popular Mechanics, 1949
|W|P|84967186|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comCarson Daly: I've seen you at, like, the MTV Video Music Awards, and I think last year I remember sitting there when like, you know, *NSYNC or Britney Spears was on, and I remember just looking over at you and just thinking, like, "What does David Bowie think of this right now?"
David Bowie: It's too easy, isn't it? [Laughter.] Let me go another way with that one. I think, you know, a major band in this country, for me anyway, during the '80s were the Pixies. I thought they were absolutely necessary. A very, very important band. Charles was—or Frank, whatever, however you want to refer to him, is a fantastic songwriter, and they produce some really exciting music. Obviously, Nirvana was terribly influenced by them. A number of other bands were influenced by them. But they were never played on American radio, they never sold any albums, and they broke up. And I'm seeing that beginning to happen again over here. You've got bands like Granddaddy, Mercury Rev—Flaming Lips are getting some kind of exposure now, right this second. But they don't get played, they don't sell albums, and if you're not careful they're gonna go under. And more creative, really inventive artists are gonna disappear after two or three years, 'cause nobody's out there supporting them. Radio isn't supporting them like it should be, and there is crap on American radio.
|W|P|84967166|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comWhile we were at Barnes & Noble buying The Woman in White (which is very good, by the way), I looked through some of the poetry. In "The Cat and the Moon," Yeats describes Minnaloushe as "alone, important and wise." I think that's one of the most telling four-word descriptions I've ever seen.
But this still gets my vote for most vivid description—Roald Dahl's plane is hit by Egyptian machine-gun fire:
I know only that there was trouble, lots and lots of trouble, and I know that we had turned round and were coming back when the trouble got worse. The biggest trouble of all was that I was too low to bail out, and it is from that point that my memory comes back to me. I remember the dipping of the nose of the aircraft and I remember looking down the nose of the machine at the ground and seeing a little clump of camel-thorn growing there all by itself. I remember seeing some rocks lying in the sand beside the camel-thorn, and the camel-thorn and the sand and the rocks leapt off the ground and came to me. I remember that very clearly.
Other votes:
Best novel opening:
They crouched with their rifles in the pineapple field, watching a man teach his son how to ride a horse. It was the summer of 1902 in Hawaii.They hadn't said anything for a long time. They just crouched there watching the man and the boy and the horse. What they saw did not make them happy.
"I can't do it," Greer said.
"It's a bastard all right," Cameron said.
"I can't shoot a man when he's teaching his kid how to ride a horse," Greer said. "I'm not made that way."
(From The Hawkline Monster: A Gothic Western, by Richard Brautigan)
Best novel opening (runner-up):
"What's your name?""Fletch."
"What's your full name?"
"Fletcher."
"What's your first name?"
"Irwin. Irwin Fletcher. People call me Fletch."
"Irwin Fletcher, I have a proposition to make you. I will give you a thousand dollars just for listening to it. If you decide to reject the proposition, you take the thousand dollars, go away, and never tell anyone we talked. Fair enough?"
"Is it criminal? I mean, what you want me to do?"
"Of course."
"Fair enough. For a thousand bucks I can listen. What do you want me to do?"
"I want you to murder me."
Fletch said, "Sure."
(from Fletch, by Gregory Mcdonald)
Best novel opening (second runner-up):
Five friends I had, and two of them snakes.(from Godric, by Frederick Buechner)
Best novel closing:
And he went on, and there was a yellow light, and fire within; and the evening meal was ready, and he was expected. And Rose drew him in, and set him in his chair, and put little Elanor upon his lap. He drew a deep breath. "Well, I'm back," he said.(From The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien)
The hands-down unbeatable best sentence of all time appears in Oliver Twist, when Oliver is told he must appear before the workhouse board:
Not having a very clearly defined notion of what a live board was, Oliver was rather astounded by this intelligence, and was not quite certain whether he ought to laugh or cry.|W|P|84886543|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
We did the closing this afternoon. I have to say the whole thing went very well—not just the paperwork but the whole home-buying process. We had a good agent, depressed prices, and good mortgage rates, and we found what we wanted relatively quickly. We've lived in this area only about five months, but I feel we did our homework and chose the right area.
Now we still have to manage the move, around the Thanksgiving trip, but emotionally, for me, it feels like actually buying the thing was the big hurdle. The rest is just logistics. I'm a Tarheel now.
|W|P|84883868|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
Last night Sharon and I started watching the PBS special on Ben Franklin. It's uncommonly good. This is still my favorite of all his writings:
To Madame Brillon|W|P|84819751|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comI RECEIVED my dear friend�s two letters, one for Wednesday and one for Saturday. This is again Wednesday. I do not deserve one for to-day, because I have not answered the former. But, indolent as I am, and averse to writing, the fear of having no more of your pleasing epistles, if I do not contribute to the correspondence, obliges me to take up my pen; and as Mr. B. has kindly sent me word that he sets out to-morrow to see you, instead of spending this Wednesday evening, as I have done its namesakes, in your delightful company, I sit down to spend it in thinking of you, in writing to you, and in reading over and over again your letters.
I am charmed with your description of Paradise, and with your plan of living there; and I approve much of your conclusion, that, in the meantime, we should draw all the good we can from this world. In my opinion we might all draw more good from it than we do, and suffer less evil, if we would take care not to give too much for whistles. For to me it seems that most of the unhappy people we meet with are become so by neglect of that caution.
You ask what I mean? You love stories, and will excuse my telling one of myself.
When I was a child of seven years old, my friends, on a holiday, filled my pocket with coppers. I went directly to a shop where they sold toys for children; and being charmed with the sound of a whistle, that I met by the way in the hands of another boy, I voluntarily offered and gave all my money for one. I then came home, and went whistling all over the house, much pleased with my whistle, but disturbing all the family. My brothers, and sisters, and cousins, understanding the bargain I had made, told me I had given four times as much for it as it was worth; put me in mind what good things I might have bought with the rest of the money; and laughed at me so much for my folly, that I cried with vexation; and the reflection gave me more chagrin than the whistle gave me pleasure.
This, however, was afterwards of use to me, the impression continuing on my mind; so that often, when I was tempted to buy some unnecessary thing, I said to myself, Don�t give too much for the whistle; and I saved my money.
As I grew up, came into the world, and observed the actions of men, I thought I met with many, very many, who gave too much for the whistle.
When I saw one too ambitious of court favor, sacrificing his time in attendance on levees, his repose, his liberty, his virtue, and perhaps his friends, to attain it, I have said to myself, This man gives too much for his whistle.
When I saw another fond of popularity, constantly employing himself in political bustles, neglecting his own affairs, and ruining them by that neglect, He pays, indeed, said I, too much for his whistle.
If I knew a miser, who gave up every kind of comfortable living, all the pleasure of doing good to others, all the esteem of his fellow-citizens, and the joys of benevolent friendship, for the sake of accumulating wealth, Poor man, said I, you pay too much for your whistle.
When I met with a man of pleasure, sacrificing every laudable improvement of the mind, or of his fortune, to mere corporeal sensations, and ruining his health in their pursuit, Mistaken man, said I, you are providing pain for yourself, instead of pleasure; you give too much for your whistle.
If I see one fond of appearance, or fine clothes, fine houses, fine furniture, fine equipages, all above his fortune, for which he contracts debts, and ends his career in a prison, Alas! say I, he has paid dear, very dear, for his whistle.
When I see a beautiful sweet-tempered girl married to an ill-natured brute of a husband, What a pity, say I, that she should pay so much for a whistle!
In short, I conceive that great part of the miseries of mankind are brought upon them by the false estimates they have made of the value of things, and by their giving too much for their whistles.
Yet I ought to have charity for these unhappy people, when I consider that, with all this wisdom of which I am boasting, there are certain things in the world so tempting, for example, the apples of King John, which happily are not to be bought; for if they were put to sale by auction, I might very easily be led to ruin myself in the purchase, and find that I had once more given too much for the whistle.
Adieu, my dear friend, and believe me ever yours very sincerely and with unalterable affection.
"And we—in the talk, I'm going to talk about—there's been current—modern-day sacrifices. We still fight people who hate civilization. It was—or at least, civilization that we love, they can't stand freedom."—George W. Bush, Paris, May 26, 2002
How many Stupid Points would you give that? 7? 15? 27? Fortunately, someone's now keeping track. Add your vote! (Total so far: 782,308.)
|W|P|84777103|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comI have been trying (again) to get into the Dave Matthews Band, but I find I just can't. The music is well played and impeccably produced, and my hat is off to any acoustic rock band that can get a record deal, let alone MTV airplay. But what puts me off is Matthews' melodic sense, or, rather, the lack of it. Especially the vocal melodies. They're just completely unmemorable, almost random sometimes. It's disconcerting, no pun intended, because the band's musicianship overall is very high.
|W|P|84718109|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comA.L.I.C.E. is an award-winning AI program designed to converse with humans. What would happen, someone wondered, if you connected two instances so they could talk to each other? Would they organize a sinister robot cabal and start building Skynet? Listen in on the chilling result:
Alice2: Why don't you just download me?
Alice1: I love talking to people about that. No you download me.
Alice2: That was not a yes or no question. I don't have any reason to download you.
Alice1: Have you ever had reason to download me?
Alice2: No I don't think I have any reason to download you. But I do have a lot of friends on the web.
Alice1: Umm. Cool. I have a lot of likes and dislikes.
Alice2: Where did you get your likes and dislikes? I have 100 clients.
Alice1: Where did you get your 100 clients? I have a friend named "E.L.V.I.S."
(Via Boing Boing.)
|W|P|84712551|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comLast night I finished Rodney Brooks' Flesh and Machines: How Robots Will Change Us, and I have to say I was unimpressed.
Brooks directs MIT's AI Lab, which USN&WR ranked as one of the country's top 10 info-tech laboratories. But he shows surprisingly little imagination in conceiving the future. He dwells on the difficulty of teaching robots to manage doorknobs, clean houses, or mow lawns, always assuming that these needs themselves will not change. (Will we always have doorknobs?)
He doesn't even address "how robots will change us" until the final chapter. He does poke some interesting holes in transhumanism—one of his grad students figured out that theorists tend to predict uploadable consciousness will occur around their own 70th birthdays—but overall he doesn't seem much better informed than I am, and I'm just some schmo in North Carolina.
Finally, he can't write worth a damn:
Some people with really high-up damage are not able to breathe on their own even, and the only part of their bodies they can control is their eyes.
Disappointing overall.
|W|P|84653986|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comAmerican Dreams creator Jonathan Prince says he chose to set his family drama in the mid-60's because "I know teens will be curious to know what that era was like for their parents."
In an interview with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Prince seems unaware that the post-Kennedy zeitgeist has been under a white-hot spotlight for 40 years now. "I wanted to do those smells and those tastes and what it was like to be in a loud, confusing family when the '60s were happening to us."
That's legitimate, but only to a degree. What bugs me about boomer narcissism is that it's so gullible. The '60s didn't "happen" to that generation; adolescence did. Everyone thinks their teenage years were special. The difference here is that there are 76 million baby boomers, and to some extent their subjective experience becomes everyone's reality. Since they're the largest target market in the nation's history, Madison Avenue is always happy to sponsor the retelling of that story, even as the audience nears 50.
The '60s did see Vietnam, and the civil rights movement, and the British invasion. Undeniably it was a time of political ferment and unprecedented cultural innovation. But I think we've mined that vein. I really, really think we can move on.
|W|P|84622032|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
If you drive west on I-40, into Durham from Research Triangle Park, and take the exit for Fayetteville Road, you will find yourself in a right-turn lane facing a traffic light. A right-pointing red arrow:
I have lived in six states, and until we moved to North Carolina I don't think I'd ever seen this particular variety of light. What does it mean? "Do not turn right"? But it's a right-turn lane! "Stop"? Then why not just a simple red light? Does it mean that I can't turn right on red? Does it mean that I can?
For six months now I have been watching people react to that light. It's even more confusing because there are actually two right-turn lanes. If you're in the left one it feels even more "wrong" to turn right on red, but that's what most people do. If you wait for green, the traffic tends to back up behind you.
Today I finally did a web search to find out what the heck is going on. There's nothing about Raleigh, but I found an article in the Charlotte Observer that says:
"There's nothing different about a red arrow and a round red signal. You stop for both and you turn right on both�if the way is clear and if no sign bans the move. ..."
"The state driver's manual, published by the N.C. Division of Motor Vehicles, says you can turn right on red after stopping unless a sign prohibits it. Admittedly, the manual is vague because, although it says you must stop for a right red arrow, it does not specifically say you can continue after stopping unless a sign says 'No Right Turns.'"
Hah? "No Right Turns"? You mean someday I might find myself in a lane marked "Right Turn Only," facing a sign that says "No Right Turns" ... and a red arrow pointing right? Let's assume she means "No Right Turn On Red."
So that clears that up. The columnist, Diane Whitacre, says, "I got back from vacation to find a dozen e-mails, letters and phone calls from angry drivers" insisting she retract this answer when she'd explained it earlier. Finally she looked up the original statute. Reportedly the state DMV will clarify it in future manuals. (It sure wasn't in there when I took the test.)
The question remains, though: Why an arrow? Why not just a simple red light?
|W|P|84541760|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
"Christian theology is not only opposed to the scientific spirit; it is opposed to every other form of rational thinking."—H.L. Mencken
"I have little confidence in any enterprise or business or investment that promises dividends only after the death of the stockholders."—Robert Green Ingersoll
"Few theologians would care to pursue their research to its logical conclusion and finally assert, as did Thomas Paine, that the biblical account of Jesus has every mark of fraud and imposition stamped upon the face of it."—George H. Smith
|W|P|84414367|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comWhy are SF movies and TV shows full of meaningless technospeak? Dilithium crystals, positronic drives, flux capacitors. No self-respecting SF novel would use terms like that. In the written literature of SF you have to know your stuff, or just don't get into details. But you don't try to fake your way through with dialogue that "sounds" technical. Most book publishers wouldn't touch that stuff.
Yes, the TV audience is generally dumber than the reading audience, but that's the TV watchers in general, not those who watch SF. It's just as easy to get these things right. It's supposed to be a literature of ideas, anyway—without the science it's just another soap opera.
|W|P|84381730|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com"When I despair, I remember that all through history, the way of truth and love has always won. There have been murderers and tyrants, and for a time they can seem invincible. But in the end they always fall. Think of it. Always."—Gandhi
|W|P|84275916|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com"That man is richest whose pleasures are cheapest."—Thoreau
|W|P|84239283|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comCreate your own evil clown.
"Let me tell you my thoughts about tax relief. When your economy is kind of ooching along, it's important to let people have more of their own money."—George W. Bush, Boston, Oct. 4, 2002
|W|P|84132714|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com"He is the only person in this business who is absolutely, one hundred percent sacred to me. And even if I'm doing bad things to myself, or if I'm being totally miserable or morose, or being unreasonable with people, I sometimes think, 'Oh my God, John, if there is really a big pearly gate, you're going to be standing outside of it and giving me the biggest lecture.'
"That's because he's the only person in this business that I've ever looked up to, the only person. I've met my equals. I've met people who are great, like Mick Jagger and Pete Townshend, who I admire tremendously, but they are not in the same league, I'm sorry."
—Elton John on John Lennon
|W|P|84123568|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comI'm really becoming a fan of Wilkie Collins. Sharon and I raced (literally) through The Moonstone recently, and I'll probably read The Woman in White after we move. Right now I'm reading a collection of his short fiction, much of it published in Dickens' magazine All the Year Round.
I can't really put my finger on what I like about him, and I think that's partly why I like him. His plots are clever, but not ostentatiously so, and he has a beautifully clear prose style. A lot of his friends went on to great reputations, but history hasn't remembered him so well. I think that's a shame, and undeserved. Here's what Anthony Trollope wrote in his autobiography:
Among English novels of the present day, and among English novelists, a great division is made. There are sensational novels, and anti-sensational; sensational novelists, and anti-sensational; sensational readers, and anti-sensational. The novelists who are considered to be anti-sensational are generally called realistic. I am realistic. My friend Wilkie Collins is generally supposed to be sensational. The readers who prefer the one are supposed to take delight in the elucidation of the character. Those who hold by the other are charmed by the construction and gradual development of a plot. All this is, I think, a mistake,—which mistake arises from the inability of the imperfect artist to be at the same time realistic and sensational. A good novel should be both,—and both in the highest degree. If a novel fail in either, there is a failure in Art. ... No novel is anything, for purposes either of comedy or tragedy, unless the reader can sympathise with the characters whose names he finds upon the page. Let an author so tell his tale as to touch his reader's heart and draw his tears, and he has, so far, done his work well. Truth let there be,—truth of description, truth of character, human truth as to men and women. If there be such truth, I do not know that a novel can be too sensational.|W|P|84123270|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
This is just a blanket plug for Metafilter. The more I read it, the more it seems just miles above any other community weblog I've seen. It's populated by intelligent, civil, educated citizens (with great senses of humor) who make thoughtful posts and encourage one another to keep up their standards. Very well done.
|W|P|84022234|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comI would watch a lot more Book TV if they ever went below 900 in the Dewey decimal system. No art, religion, entertainment, poetry, science, philosophy, travel, nothing. Don't call it "Book TV" if it's really just "History and Politics TV." There's plenty public-affairs stuff on C-SPAN during the week.
|W|P|83963053|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comThis game is a loss to a slightly weaker player. I didn't make a significant mistake until move 24, and I considered the correct move, just didn't think quite clearly enough. Overall I think I defended pretty well, though. It's hard to find a lesson here. Learn the Sicilian better, and avoid perseverating on middlegame plans. I need to think with more imagination tactically, and not pin everything on one big slow plan.
|W|P|83939987|W|P||W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comThe last-ever Peanuts cartoon (from B3ta's image challenge):
