Monday, November 04, 2019

If you ever catch a great boss

"If you ever catch a great boss, it's just such a rare thing, and it's amazing."
~ James L. Brooks


Choosing life in the face of death 

— David G. Myers




“We who are dying need from you what we should be demanding from ourselves—responsibility, honesty, the courage to face reality squarely. It matters less what you say to us than how you talk to us—face-to-face, as Moses spoke with God. And after all, who knows but that you might be the one, by your kindness and faith, to give us the strength to choose life in the face of death?” — David G. Myers  (d. 26 September 2014)

Read the entire posting — and read the hundreds of great literary criticism postings at David’s superb blog — via this link. 


Personal Postscript — I offer the foregoing, written by the late David Myers, because we all need kindness and faith as we choose life in the face of death.



SARAH HOYT:  “I’ve watched otherwise sane people — people I used to believe were sane — believe the most outrageous things. Yeah, and say the most outrageous things, in this year of our 3 of the Falling Masks. I understand it. A lot of them are good people. But continuing to belong to the circles they belong requires them to believe certain things.”




That Terrible Last Season Of Game Of Thrones? Turns Out Creators Really Didn’t Know They Were Doing



” They apparently kept being surprised at their experience, and not just through its now-infamous, unseen pilot, which the duo has long admitted was a complete disaster. It just seems like even as the show evolved into the success it became, the duo—who scripted the vast majority of the series, taking on even more work when the show began outpacing the source material from George R.R. Martin—were still, apparently, largely unsure about anything they were doing.” –Gizmodo 
WOW:  Australian Raptors Start Fires To Flush Out Prey.

Good History, Philosophy, Should Inspire Wonder


Philosophy, Aristotle tells us in hisMetaphysics, begins with wonder. History does too. It starts with obvious perplexities but also with our realisation of the strangeness of the everyday, making our head swim. – Aeon








“Even though every individual possesses the truth, when he or she gets together in a crowd, untruth will be present at once, for the crowd is untruth.” 
~ Søren Kierkegaard, undated journal entry, c. 1846-47 via Barowitch

Flip Flop: UK Halts Fracking in England, Effective Immediately, Over Earthquake Fears

UK halts all fracking in England with immediate effect. On its face, a big win, but will the Tories make the moratorium permanent?

The Failed FBI Plot to Paint Trump Doing Deals with Putin Larry Johnson, Sic Semper Tyrannis. It’s extraordinary — by which, I suppose that I now mean it’s completely normal — that after three years of hysteria, RussiaGate, which from day one was couched as impeachment-worthy, doesn’t even feature in the actual impeachment inquiry, now that we have one, even though the cast of characters and what LeCarré would calk the “handwriting” are both the same. Which doesn’t in and of itself invalidate UkraineGate. But holy moley


How the Best Bosses Interrupt Bias on Their Teams - Harvard Business Review – “Companies spend millions on antibias training each year. The goal is to create workforces that are more inclusive, and thereby more innovative and more effective.

To err is human. Missteps, misapprehensions, misspeakings, momentary lapses and mess-ups are part of the fabric of life. Yet we are capable of making mistakes precisely because we are thoughtful, intelligent beings with complex goals and sincerely held values. We wouldn’t be able to if we were otherwise. Regrets: we’ve had a few. But we are the wiser for them."Social scientists have championed theories of human infallibility in many matters. But mistakes are central to who we are... Success of Failure 

To accommodate drinking, the Literary Review established the Academy Club. Poets were banned for never paying their tabs and for bad conversation... Literary Poets  





Did They Just Discover A Portrait Of Machiavelli Painted By Leonardo Da Vinci?



“An unsigned painting of an unidentified bald man with a beard has aroused excitement among historians and art buffs after lying largely unnoticed in the collection of a historic chateau in central France for decades.” That chateau belonged to the renowned diplomat Talleyrand, and a document signed by his chamberlain is what set off all the fuss. – Yahoo! (AFP)