Thursday, April 14, 2005



Why does it happen so quickly? You throw a stone into the air and it has to overcome gravity, so its rise is slow, and that is why the days of childhood are so long and leisurely. But as the stone falls, it goes faster and faster, with a velocity of thirty-two feet per second, so that your sense of time finally is that of a rush into death. As the Book of Job puts it, ‘My days fly faster than the weaver’s shuttle.’ Towards the end you rush towards the earth, towards death. What does this acceleration signify? Why is it that the days of childhood seem to last for years, whereas in old age the days resemble those flutter books you used to buy in ‘specialty’ shops—you rippled the pages with your thumb and you’d see a comic performance—a hula dancer or a dog at a hydrant. That’s how fast it goes. And the question is what happens to your original sense of being when the thumb of time flutters your penultimate pages? Everybody, I believe, will know exactly what I am talking about.
Saul Bellow, quoted in Salmagundi, Spring-Summer 1995

Kafka asked him to destroy them after his death; he did not. Some of us will be forever grateful to Brod. Identity, tolerance, and the virgin seekers

Art of Living & Literature Across Frontiers: Many a truth is said in jest
My hands are covered with blood, there's no where to hide the sin of my soul. What do I have left to offer Thee, is there nothing left to love in me? Each kiss is like touching fire, both beautiful and painful in the same short moment. I want to dance in the embers. My heart is a cold river stone , shiny on the outside, yet so breakable. Am I nothing more than dust? Then why do I live as though my life will transcend the finite? And will there not be consequences for my actions?

Throughout history--beginning with our earliest ancestors who painted on cave walls--people have used images to communicate their thoughts and ideas. Yet as a society, while we understand and effortlessly use the power of visual communication in our personal lives, we're just now awakening to its tremendous potential in our business lives. With the democratization of technology, in the form of the Internet, wireless communications, and easy-to-use, inexpensive digital devices, the doors to Going Visual are now open to virtually any organization or businessperson.


• Bob Goldstein How and why to make visual communication a powerful competitive tool [The Experience and Expression of Gender among Women Taxi Drivers She's No Lady ; via Adrian the Cabbie ; Special link for Minna and Co ;-D Krazy Finnish Supermarkets ]
• · Like wars, large law firms spawn special and unique hatreds. There are factions within factions. The corporate people hate the less profitable litigators and their costly overheads. The commercial litigators sneer at insurance litigators Intra-office politics; Brad Zellar lists his funniest novels of all time Funniest ; via Boyton
• · · Thousands Of Small Publishers Add Up ; If you enjoy reading fiction, you might enjoy my book Book Busking ; To scholarly publishers it seems that for generations, dissertations have been built on a surprisingly simple formula Open Secrets: Unpublishable Groundbreaking Dissertations
• · · · Back in Australia I cycle every day: One of my favorite places to read is the top floor of the Perry Castañeda library, where I sit in a study carrel with high walls that block out most distractions. Conversations between a Plan II Freshman and J.M. Coetzee ; Seats in luxury suites at professional baseball and football games went “mostly to people with clout. Naturally, Philly Box Seats ; Christopher Stephens Cold River, 2005, oil on panel, 6"x12", $600
• · · · · Parents want to read to their children but complain they do not have a spare 10 minutes a day to open a book, a national survey has revealed. Parents neglect story time ; As the saying goes, sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. This article resonates with my four Australian girls as well as my sisters back in Europe strongly Everybody loves lazy stereotyping of male roles
• · · · · · Forever and a Day: One man’s tragedy has always been another man’s entertainment. The public loves scandal, however much the intellectuals may lament. People love to see the hypocrite naked before their eyes. The more respectable the victim, the juicier the gossip. They are renowned for having a slippery relationship with the truth, but this week's goss mags are in an even more loathsome tangle than usual. Those sympathetic to the couples cite the twists and complexities of love and marriage, the mistakes of youth, the right to happiness Commoners and Royals: extramarital sexual encounters ; Unveiling the occult Trade fair indicates booming market in world of alternative