"The nuts and bolts of the European union are hardly riveting, but a basic knowledge of its institutions are essential to understanding how it works." The Economist
Did you catch it?
This is why I enjoy the Economist. It's so subtle, it makes perfect sense without full understanding. I often find myself laughing outloud as I read it. the way the editors manage to turn words in a way that seems perfectly natural so that you are often left wondering...was that intentional? National Review occassionally has a clever play on words in its opening section. They are humorous, but bald.
I'm not sure I've ever read another magazine on current events that even attempted a joke.
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Friday, March 30, 2007
On brackets
I made out a bracket on ESPN.com this year. A friend sent me an invitation so I filled a few out. I am reminded again why I don't fill out brackets.
I am an intensely competitive person. Games of all sorts require of me a rigid self-control. If I play a ball game I have to forget the score. If I play with the sort of person who repeats it after every play the ruthlessness emerges from its lair. It is a force of nature which I have fought for years to bury and to kill. Board games are a bit different. It's harder to forget who's winning. When I play a board game one of three things generally happens. Sometimes I give up and enjoy the game. This is a victory for me though I generally lose. More often I try to win. Either I do win, in which case the victory is hollow, leading only to the desire to win again; or I lose, in which case I get this terrible sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. This leads me to be unbearable around as you all well know. I become a surly wreck. Well everyone who is likely to read this blog has seen that so I won't explain further.
Which leads me to brackets. One of the joys of the tournament for me is rooting for the underdog. I would love nothing more than to see a 16 seed take out a 1 seed someday. But my competitive nature impels me to fill out a bracket as I think the tournament will actually turn out, not as I hope it will. I just can't fill out a bracket with four 16 seeds in the final four. I also want my bracket to win. Which means that when the games are going on I find myself actually rooting for the higher seeds. And so I can't root for the underdog, and the one thing that makes the tournament enjoyable for me.
So next year no brackets. Until next year by which time I will have inevitably forgoten the lesson I learned this year.
I am an intensely competitive person. Games of all sorts require of me a rigid self-control. If I play a ball game I have to forget the score. If I play with the sort of person who repeats it after every play the ruthlessness emerges from its lair. It is a force of nature which I have fought for years to bury and to kill. Board games are a bit different. It's harder to forget who's winning. When I play a board game one of three things generally happens. Sometimes I give up and enjoy the game. This is a victory for me though I generally lose. More often I try to win. Either I do win, in which case the victory is hollow, leading only to the desire to win again; or I lose, in which case I get this terrible sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. This leads me to be unbearable around as you all well know. I become a surly wreck. Well everyone who is likely to read this blog has seen that so I won't explain further.
Which leads me to brackets. One of the joys of the tournament for me is rooting for the underdog. I would love nothing more than to see a 16 seed take out a 1 seed someday. But my competitive nature impels me to fill out a bracket as I think the tournament will actually turn out, not as I hope it will. I just can't fill out a bracket with four 16 seeds in the final four. I also want my bracket to win. Which means that when the games are going on I find myself actually rooting for the higher seeds. And so I can't root for the underdog, and the one thing that makes the tournament enjoyable for me.
So next year no brackets. Until next year by which time I will have inevitably forgoten the lesson I learned this year.
Thursday, March 15, 2007
And the Ides Have It
Happy Ides of March Julius Caesar. I hope that all of my loyal readers (all 4 of you) are luckier today than he was on his last Ides.
Friday, March 09, 2007
On Beethoven
I'm listening to John Eliot Gardiners renditionof the third symphony. This, I have conluded over the last few years is my favorite Beethoven symphony.
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
A Review: The Bonfire of the Vanities
It's ironic that Steven used this as a post title; I had this post ready to go and it somehow got deleted about a week ago.
Suffering is a basic element of human existence. We do our best to ignore it when we can, and we try to avoid it when we can no longer deny it. It is generally only the truly desparate or introspective who recognize its place in our lives. It is a deep and strong psychological force, even when we refuse to recognize its existence. Most of the vices of men are sought, at least in part, in an effort to alleviate this suffering: avarice, gluttony, envy, lust, pride, even anger is a response to perceived injustice. Suffering has been a basic component of the human condition since the arrival of sin in the world. Our separation from God entails suffering. Even in the post Christ age we still inhabit a fallen world.
Tom Wolfe's work rests on the recognition of this fact. In each of his works that I have read the main character begins the story in the flight from suffering. Over the course of the novel, they are slowly forced to recognize its existence and eventually embrace it as a fundamental piece of their identity and existence. This storyline lends itself to incredibly moving tales when woven by the master storyteller that Wolfe is.
The Bonfire of the vanities is no different. It is divided roughly into thirds: a comedy of errors in which McCoy goes to ever increasing lengths to protect the myth of his own greatness; the tragic and methodical unravelling of the web of lies he has surrounded himself with; and a heroic tale of of his struggle to reconcile himself to reality and at the same time stand up and fight. He undergoes a fascinating transformation from a weak--though emminently successful--disembler, into a strong--though eminently unsuccessful--human being with a firmer grasp on the reality of life.
The story is a tale of facades, some crumbling, some rising some to protect from the self, some to protect from the outside, but all ultimately designed to shield ourselves from the recognition that suffering exists.
Suffering is a basic element of human existence. We do our best to ignore it when we can, and we try to avoid it when we can no longer deny it. It is generally only the truly desparate or introspective who recognize its place in our lives. It is a deep and strong psychological force, even when we refuse to recognize its existence. Most of the vices of men are sought, at least in part, in an effort to alleviate this suffering: avarice, gluttony, envy, lust, pride, even anger is a response to perceived injustice. Suffering has been a basic component of the human condition since the arrival of sin in the world. Our separation from God entails suffering. Even in the post Christ age we still inhabit a fallen world.
Tom Wolfe's work rests on the recognition of this fact. In each of his works that I have read the main character begins the story in the flight from suffering. Over the course of the novel, they are slowly forced to recognize its existence and eventually embrace it as a fundamental piece of their identity and existence. This storyline lends itself to incredibly moving tales when woven by the master storyteller that Wolfe is.
The Bonfire of the vanities is no different. It is divided roughly into thirds: a comedy of errors in which McCoy goes to ever increasing lengths to protect the myth of his own greatness; the tragic and methodical unravelling of the web of lies he has surrounded himself with; and a heroic tale of of his struggle to reconcile himself to reality and at the same time stand up and fight. He undergoes a fascinating transformation from a weak--though emminently successful--disembler, into a strong--though eminently unsuccessful--human being with a firmer grasp on the reality of life.
The story is a tale of facades, some crumbling, some rising some to protect from the self, some to protect from the outside, but all ultimately designed to shield ourselves from the recognition that suffering exists.
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