Moo

From "The secret life of moody cows" (The Times):

Once they were a byword for mindless docility. But cows have a secret mental life in which they bear grudges, nurture friendships and become excited over intellectual challenges, scientists have found.

Cows are also capable of feeling strong emotions such as pain, fear and even anxiety — they worry about the future. But if farmers provide the right conditions, they can also feel great happiness.

The kitchen in our first place in Chicago was cavernous and well-lit, but it was also whitewashed -- the cabinets, the walls, even the appliances. All white. A cheap alternative to rehabbing, I guess. For a couple of months, I just frowned and scrubbed that blank room. And then, it hit me: All this place needs is some cow spots. Cheap, fun "design."

Hey. It worked.

The cows dribbled into a couple of other rooms. Knobs on the mission oak library table. Mugs. Pencils. Bookends. A knick here. A knack there.

That worked, too. I'm not fussy.

The country place, though, has a new, contemporary kitchen in those soft pinkish hues "real" designers like. Yeah. It's no place for cow spots. But a few linger on. And that works, too. Call it a moocow thing. Apparently, it has caught on. A decade ago, I couldn't find dishes or towels or knick-knacks with cows or cow spots. Now? They're everywhere.

Heh, heh, heh. I'm betting none of you would have taken me for a gal who would slap cow spots on the fridge and walls, step back, and say, "This is good."

Let alone write about it.

Keep 'em guessing. That's always fun.

The recommended daily allowance

Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and this moocow that was coming down along the road met a nicens little boy named baby tuckoo....

His father told him that story: his father looked at him through a glass: he had a hairy face.

He was baby tuckoo. The moocow came down the road where Betty Byrne lived; she sold lemon platt.

A Portrait of the Artist As a Young Man (James Joyce)

The West Memphis Three

"High Court Rejects Another Damien Echols' Petition" (February 24, 2005)

We've written about the West Memphis Three before. I was reminded of Echols last night while watching part of Murder by Numbers, a contemporary spin on the Leopold and Loeb story. The so-so movie featured Michael Pitt as the brains behind an immoral but "perfect" crime. "Wow. He looks so much like Damien Echols," I thought. A Google search and two clicks later, I learned that Pitt is slated to play Echols in a film entitled West Memphis Three.

Ebert's review of Murder by Numbers.

Two other blog recommendations

Ever so humble

Megan and Murray

Links for a Saturday afternoon

From "An Ode to Failure" (The Economist):

Americans have always been excessive worshippers of what William James called “the bitch goddess success”. Self-help gurus have topped the bestseller list since Benjamin Franklin published his autobiography. Americans are much more likely than Europeans to believe that people can get ahead in life so long as they are willing to work hard. And they are much more likely to choose a high-paying job that carries a risk of redundancy than a lower-paid job that guarantees security.

But you can't have winners without losers (or how would you know how well you are doing?). And you can't broaden opportunity without also broadening the opportunity to fail. For instance, until relatively recently, blacks could not blame themselves for their failure in the “race of life”, in Abraham Lincoln's phrase, because they were debarred from so many parts of it. Now the barriers are lifted, the picture is more complicated.

All of which creates a huge problem: how exactly should a hyper-competitive society deal with its losers? It is all very well to note that drunkards and slackers get what they deserve. But what about the honest toilers?

From "Contemplating Churchill" (Smithsonian):

Constancy of mind and persistency of purpose—those are familiar Churchillian virtues: they led him out of the wilderness and England out of darkness.

From "The Five-Billion-Star Hotel" (Popular Science):

For his next hotel enterprise, Bigelow is looking beyond the bright lights of Las Vegas—beyond Earth’s atmosphere, in fact. He is actively engaged in an effort to build the planet’s first orbiting space hotel. Bargain-basement room rate: $1 million a night. For its water show, this hotel will have all of Earth’s blue oceans flying past its windows at 17,500 miles an hour. Guests on board the 330-cubic-meter station (about the size of a three-bedroom house) will learn weightless acrobatics, marvel at the ever-changing face of the home planet, and, for half of every 90-minute orbit, gaze deep into a galaxy ablaze with stars.

From "Happy Hour" (Psychology Today):

The things we expect will bring us lasting joy rarely do. Whether it's losing 25 pounds, getting a major promotion or watching a troupe of perennial losers finally win the big one, long-anticipated events give us a swell of glee...and then we settle back into being just about as happy as we've always been. Most of us have a happiness "set point," fixed by temperament and early life experience, which is very difficult to shift. Whether you win the lottery or wind up in a wheelchair, within a year or two you generally end up just about as happy (or unhappy) as you started out.

Yet the quest for happiness isn't futile. Psychologists now believe that many of us can turn the well-being thermostat up or down a few notches by changing how we think about anticipation, memory and the present moment. Our sense of well-being is intimately tied into our perception of time. The problem is that we usually get it wrong. Memory tricks us--we don't remember our experiences properly, and that leaves us unable to accurately imagine the way we'll feel in the future. At the same time, expectations mislead us: We never learn to predict what will make us happy, or how to anticipate the impact of major life experiences.

More Steinberg and another blog recommendation

From Neil Steinberg's column today (yes, we're still talking about "Gifties"):

The troublemakers are given Nikes for turning in their weapons, while the smart, hardworking kids have to run the projectors.

You mean someone WINS?!?
Here is my own personal experience. My oldest son belongs to Chess Wizards, a program that comes into public schools and sets up chess clubs, pairing interested students with experienced teachers.

Some schools, I am told, resist. They don't like chess.

Any idea why?

Think hard.

In chess . . . someone wins, usually.

Can't have that. The losers might feel bad.

Nope. We can't have that.

And another blog to explore: Book World.

Gort! Klaatu barada nikto!

From "The tale of the Iraqi librarian who saved the books she loves" (Christian Science Monitor):

[Jeanette Winter's "The Librarian of Basra: A True Story from Iraq"] was inspired by a July 2003, article in The New York Times about Alia Muhammad Baker, the chief librarian of Basra's Central Library, who was determined to protect the library's holdings when US troops entered Iraq and fighting and looting broke out.

When her own government refused to help, Ms. Baker began spiriting the collection to safety herself, book by book. She carried the books to her home and to a neighboring restaurant, managing with the help of friends to preserve 70 percent of the collection before the historic building burned to the ground nine days later.

Thanks for the link, R.T.

By the way, AN wrote to say that she has been following the "Gifties" discussion, and she writes, in part, "R.T.'s observations were particularly clear, level-headed, and honest." The topic reminded her of this observation in Pixar's The Incredibles: "When everyone is super then no one is."

Ayup.

Added later: A few days ago, I mentioned corresponding with K.B., who blogs at "Girl Detective." Today, her husband wrote with a link:

R.T.'s quote reminded me of this essay by Paul Graham.

Of course, any institution that deals with large numbers of people is going to run into problems when it tries to group them into manageable units.

I think Graham gets it right when he says, "But like many fouls, this one was unintentional."

It probably isn't enough to address the issue either as a failing of the institution, or as a failing of the individual [studentparentfamily]. I guess the best solution at the moment is a school that does enough to keep students in class and a family situation that encourages independent thought and study. Easy.

Thanks for the link and message, G.F.

Let's see... thanks, C., for your recent email message and recommendation. The Disadvantages of Being Educated & Other Essays (Albert J. Nock) has been entered (in pen) on the "To be acquired list" because C. writes, in part, "I don't know how he has managed to escape the 'to read' list on classical education issues. He is a wonderful combination of Paul Fussell and Tracey Lee Simmons. In fact, I think Simmons said he was the only modern author he ever liked." C., like R.T. and M. (one of M-mv's first three "regulars"), periodically posts at another forum I visit. Intelligence and humor define the contributions of these smart women. Their recommendations and remarks always make me think.

Speaking of smart women, according to the History Channel's "This Day in History," on this day in 1956, Sylvia Plath met Ted Hughes at a party in Cambridge, MA. The poets married four months later. The rest is literary history, indeed.

Book recommendations:

The Bell Jar (Plath)

Collected Poems (Plath)

The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath

Collected Poems (Hughes)

Birthday Letters: Poems (Hughes)

The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes (Janet Malcolm)

And speaking of marriage, twenty years ago tomorrow, a shy guy proposed to a preoccupied college coed. She said, "Yes." Three children and two decades of ordinary history later, they still say, "I love you." And mean it. It's not the stuff folks write about, but it works.


More blogs
(Yes, I added this section later.) I ran out of time while working on this entry. File the following under "Women who are mothers and readers, thinkers, and writers."

Destination: Samarqand

pages turned

Book Moot

Schola

A Circle of Quiet

Semicolon

Buried Treasure

And if you missed this entry, click on over and bookmark the folks I linked there. Good stuff.


The recommended daily allowance
The Day the Earth Stood Still

Mr. Harley: Your impatience is understandable.
Klaatu: I'm impatient with stupidity. My people have learned to live without it.
Mr. Harley: I'm afraid my people haven't.


Klaatu: You have faith, Professor Barnhardt?
Barnhardt: It isn't faith that makes good science, Mr. Klaatu, it's curiosity. Sit down, please. There are several thousand questions I'd like to ask you.


Klaatu: I am fearful when I see people substituting fear for reason.


Helen: Gort! Klaatu barada nikto!

That one can watch this 1951 film and not be distracted by the (per today's standards) silly flying saucer and awkward space robot goes a long way to explaining how this social-commentary-masquerading-as-sci-fi has become a classic.

Gifted

From the talented R.T.:

I tried to look at this "gifted" thing without my usual skepticism, but have to wonder. Do you know any adults who are gifted? Whom you would call gifted? I know smart people, in all kinds of professions. Street smart, book smart, people smart. Hard working and enthusiastic and motivated. Particularly knowledgeable in some areas, not so in others. Creative or technical or civic-minded or driven or well-rounded or generous. But particularly "gifted." What in the world does this mean?

Where are all the high school valedictorians today? Are the stem-cell researchers and the civic leaders and the policy writers and the supreme court judges and the great authors and the world-famous artists and the nuclear physicists and the peace-makers and the few who can rewire a toaster -- were they in "gifted" programs? Were they the high achievers of their elementary and secondary school programs? The ones who could have been wearing the "Gifties" t-shirts? And would they have, even if they were thus tagged?

While I have done no research, and offer no statistics to support my case, my average-joe observations (and the biographies of some of our most noteworthy human beings) suggest that there is little, if any, correlation.

So why do we persist in nailing our children to a standard that, over time, means relatively nothing and provides even less? Gifted? LD? Average? Does this mean anything, anything at all in the world of life? Does it matter anywhere beyond the walls of an isolated experience we have come to call education?

I propose this for the poor children not being offered a gifted program by a teacher of twenty or thirty "average" children. Bring a book of your choice to school. Dig into that area of interest. Don't WAIT for the teacher to assign you work. Go after it yourself. See if you can get passes to the library, maybe even the science lab or the music room. Hang out with some of those LD kids; you may be surprised at what you will learn from them. And to the parents? Please ask yourself this. Is your goal to have your child labeled and directed? If so, I don't care how much that over-burdened teacher throws at them, as long as they wait for someone else to spoon-feed them what they want to know, they will be bored.

But if your goal is to give them the freedom to learn, this can more easily be accomplished. Just stand back and let them figure it out. Remember, somebody said they are gifted. Why do you think you know better than they?

And over at Outer Life, check out this entry.

A little more on "Gifties"

Yesterday, I mentioned the "Gifties" brouhaha. Neil Steinberg covers it in today's column:

It takes extra effort to keep smart students interested, and a teacher can't -- OK, isn't expected to -- prepare one lesson for the bulk of class, another for those lagging behind and yet a third for students who already get it and are pawing at the ground to go forward. If the choice is between helping a student who is bored out of his mind, and a student who can't read, guess which student gets the attention?

This is isn't a free speech issue, it's a fairness issue. If those kids had worn T-shirts declaring "Beaubien Basketball Rocks!" my bet is they wouldn't have gotten into trouble. But let some gifted students express pride, and adults fret that they'll make the average kids feel bad. That's just tough; wait until real life gets ahold of them. [Emphasis added.]

Ayup. This reminds me of this entry (yeah, again). Heh, heh, heh. "Sooner or later... most kids will be forced to confront their own mediocrity." And it won't be pretty, will it?

Speaking of gifted, let us point you to some worthwhile writers on the web:

The Rage Diaries: Smart writing on a variety of topics. We recommend Lisa's site a lot.

Magnificent Octopus: A reader, writer, thinker, and, yes, mother. More smart writing. Terrific book recommendations. And no whining. Or paper-plate-painting. See? It can be done.

Outer Life: Ayup. More smart writing. This guy should publish a book of his observations. We'd buy it.

Collected Miscellaney: I know. I'm repeating myself, but... more smart writing and terrific book recommendations.

Brandywine Books: Book news and reviews and links that make one think. The blogger is also charmingly self-effacing: "I'd like to say, like Limbaugh says, that this blog is all about what interests me, if I thought that would make a readable blog; but really it's about what you like of what interests me. You aren't subscribers in the old-fashioned sense, and I'm not making any money from this. Still, your interest is important to me, so I persevere to blog. With miles to go before I sleep."

Bread Crumbs: Interesting excerpts, links, and commentary on news and events... among other things.

Struggle in a Bungalow Kitchen: This blogger and I met over my criticism of mommy-blogging and reconnected last week over a, hmmmm, let's call it a feminist rabbit hole. Quality writing.

Quiet Life: D.B. probably doesn't know this, but I visit her site every day right after reading email. Many of M-mv's "regulars" will not understand this seeming disparity between my talk and my walk, but D.B.'s gentle humor, unabashed joy in the simple (to say nothing of the pop cultural), and sincerity removes the blog from even the greatest cynic's reproach.

Language Log: This site never fails to make me think. Quality writing. Cool topics.

And I have run out of time without listing all of the sites. More later.

A beauty both great and terrible

This morning, about ten loping paces from the kitchen window, a Cooper's hawk caught and feasted on a dark-eyed junco.

"Gifties"

This story will not, of course, appeal to everyone, but it certainly tickled us. What a discussion followed... and has continued through the early afternoon. Just a few weeks ago, headline news included a report that "[t]he way many high school students see it, government censorship of newspapers may not be a bad thing, and flag burning is hardly protected free speech." In short, a frightening number of the teens surveyed had little use for the First Amendment. Not the recent graduates of Beaubien Elementary School, though, eh? Being smart has its privileges, I guess, like, oh, I don't know... the ability to understand, appreciate, and apply the U.S. Constitution?

Heh, heh, heh.

Another thread running through Family M-mv's conversations today is a gently heated argument about the sadness quotient in two myths; that is, we're debating the following question:

From a storyteller's seat, which is sadder: the death of Achilles' friend Patroclus or of Gilgamesh's friend Enkindu? Why?

Grammarian

Miss Gould, as she was known to everyone at the magazine, died last week, at the age of eighty-seven. She worked here for fifty-four years, most of them as its Grammarian (a title invented for her), and she earned the affection and gratitude of generations of writers. She shaped the language of the magazine, always striving for a kind of Euclidean clarity--transparent, precise, muscular. It was an ideal that seemed to have not only syntactical but moral dimensions.

Reading this article reminded me of Diana Athill's memoir Stet. (See our 11.25.2003 RDA.)

Three primrose plants

We carried a piece of spring home in a small, discarded box yesterday afternoon, the Misses M-mv and I. Primrose plants were $1 each at Jewel. A $1 to bring home color, to peek at the next chapter of country life. We've read part of summer, all of autumn, and most of winter. Our primroses hint at what comes next. The plants smell like rich, wet earth. They smell like life, warm and new.

This morning, Mr. M-mv and I were roused by cries of delight and disbelief. "More snow!" squealed the Misses M-mv. Scra-a-a-pe, swish; scra-a-a-pe, swish, Master M-mv's shovel later replied.

Over coffee, my eyes lingered on the box of primroses on the counter and then on the pines out back dusted with snow. Lazily, back and forth. It was not a distracting dilemma. I contemplated two sorts of beauty: warm, bright messengers and cold, majestic sentries. Both filled me with awe and gratitude. I live here. I live among old, tall trees and people who are moved by the sight of three bright plants in the kitchen.

We carried a piece of spring home in a small, discarded box yesterday afternoon, the Misses M-mv and I.

It smells like life.

E.B. White

We last posted about E.B. White in January -- "'Endings are a catharsis.'"

What a delight to discover this piece over at The New Yorker.

White’s gift to writers is clarity, which he demonstrates so easily in setting down the daily details of his farm chores: the need to pack the sides of his woodshed with sprucebrush against winter; counterweighting the cold-frame windows, for easier operation; the way the wind is ruffling the surface of the hens’ water fountain. Clarity is the message of “The Elements of Style,” the handbook he based on an early model written by Will Strunk, a professor of his at Cornell, which has helped more than ten million writers—the senior honors candidate, the rewriting lover, the overburdened historian—through the whichy thicket. “Write in a way that comes naturally,” it pleads. “Do not explain too much.” Write like White, in short, and his readers, finding him again and perhaps absorbing in the process something of that steely modesty, may sense as well the uses of patience in waiting to discover what kind of writer will turn up on their page, and finding contentment with that writer’s life.

Spend tomorrow's first cup of French roast with this tribute to an American treasure.

Added later

K.B., who has sent me a number of thought-provoking comments and challenges over the last week or two, reminded me today that this entry from December complements a number of recent entries on parenting, including yesterday's. Thanks, K.B.

The recommended daily allowance

From Michael Dirda's Bound to Please: An Extraordinary One-Volume Literary Education:

Now and again, we may feel that just maybe we've shortchanged our better selves, that we might have listened to great music, contemplated profoundly moving works of art, read books that mattered, but instead we turned away from them because it was time to tune into Law and Order reruns, or jack into a WarCraft game on our home computer, or get back to the the latest made-for-TV bestseller. Sometimes, nonetheless, late at night or when faced with one of life's true crises, we will surprise in ourselves what poet Philip Larkin called the hunger to be more serious.

Ayup.

Dirda notes, though, that "[c]ome the dawn... our good intentions usually evaporate."

Here's to all of the readers, thinkers, and autodidacts whose intentions have never evaporated -- even when they became parents, employees, volunteers, etc. It's good to know we're not the only ones to heed Thoreau's advice: Read the best books first, or you may not have a chance to read them at all.

A seeming unrelated aside: Recently, several new links popped up in our stats, each of which brought us ten or more visitors. Naturally, I clicked on over to see whether we had earned a nod in an entry or in a sidebar. Alas, two of the destinations were anything but recommendations, and both reminded me of Joseph Epstein's observation: Delight in excellence is easily confused with snobbery by the ignorant. (An oldie but goodie on this topic.)

Self-esteem

From "Yep, life'll burst that self-esteem bubble" (USA Today):

Kids born in the '70s and '80s are now coming of age. The colorful ribbons and shiny trophies they earned just for participating made them feel special. But now, in college and the workplace, observers are watching them crumble a bit at the first blush of criticism.

...

To be clear, self-esteem is important to healthy development. Kids who hold themselves in poor stead are thought to be most vulnerable to trouble — from low academic achievement to drug abuse or crime. For those from disadvantaged backgrounds, the stakes may be higher and the needs even greater. But empty praise — the kind showered on many kids years ago in the name of self-esteem — did more harm than good.

Many years ago? Shoot, man. They're still at it, the parent-whisperers with their "Oh, good boy, Jakey! You almost made it to the potty, my little man!" and "Yes, my baby girl! You were so wonderful catching that ball! Good girl!"

You know how I feel about "Parenting as performance art." In this entry, Lisa over at "The Rage Diaries" suggests that the kids who are raised with this sort of inanity underscoring all of their efforts, large and small, grow into adults who cannot stand to have their worldview challenged or, worse, dismissed.

I used to wonder why on earth a drive-by correspondent should care what I think of their unsolicited opinion, and then it hit me one day: by failing to acknowledge it as special, I was failing to acknowledge them as special. I was discrediting their world view, which was that who they were and what they did were absolutely worth other people's time, simply because they were the ones doing it.

"Where on earth is this exalted sense of self coming from?" I wondered. "These people are the seatwarmers of the e-mail world."

Heh, heh, heh.

I read this bit in The Atlantic last night.

At some point, which is to say the late 1990s, the focus of parenting shifted almost entirely away from preparing kids for, among other things, the dangers, responsibilities, and unpredictability of life. Or, it's just possible to imagine, parents decided that children's self-esteem was the best defense against an unkind world, and so they set about—while they still could—staging a million Truman Shows to ensure outcomes that were never less than validating for their little ones. Well, buckle your seat belts: the backlash is here. Those non-authoritarian, all-validating, all-encouraging, all-active, all-listening, all-providing, never-raise-a-voice-in-anger, teach-don't-punish, feel-good moms and dads now rate all the respect of yesterday's bees in a Saturday Night Live sketch.

Read Sandra Tsing Loh's complete review, "Marshal Plan." Good stuff.

No whine with my cheese, thanks

Joanne Jacobs directs us to this take on the recent "Mommy madness" (or mommy stupidity, depending on your perspective). It's a clever entry, but the subject has begun to bore me.

An antidote: a book and a large mug of strong coffee with a generous whipped cream head drizzled with caramel. Today's companion? Bound to Please (Michael Dirda).

Read. Think. Write. Learn. Laugh. Play. Work. Live.

Notice the absence of "whine."

Yeah. This pretty much describes my reading habits.

But he always found time to read — science fiction, history, the classics — anything but a Harlequin romance.

Read "Pop.: 1 Plus 5,000 Volumes" (Los Angeles Times).

Museum notes

["(Behind the scenes) at the museum" may interest you, too.]

The "Body Worlds" exhibit will run at the Museum of Science and Industry through early September. From the MSI website:

The exhibition features more than 200 authentic human specimens, including entire bodies, individual organs and transparent body slices that have been preserved through the process of “plastination,” a technique that replaces bodily fluids and fat. BODY WORLDS offers a once-in-a-lifetime chance to see and understand our own physiology and health and to gain new appreciation and respect for what it means to be human.

Plastination was developed by Gunther von Hagens at the Institute for Anatomy at Heidelberg University. According to the Sun-Times, "Specimens are subjected to a vacuum process and then bodily fluids and fat are replaced with substances like silicone rubber or epoxy." Read their complete review here.

By the way, according to the Sun-Times, MSI is hosting free days (general admission only) on Mondays and Tuesdays through March 15.


Other "free day" information
Adler Planetarium: Mondays and Tuesdays from through March 1

Field Museum: Mondays and Tuesdays from through February 28

Art Institute: Ford Free Tuesdays

Oriental Institute Museum: Every day (although there is a suggested donation)

Chicago Historical Society: Mondays

The Notebaert Nature Museum: Thursdays

DuSable Museum of African American History: Sundays

Visit the websites and call the museum in advance of your visit to ensure that the information above is correct.

Today's third cup of coffee...

was spent in the company of "The Revenge of the Nerds" by Steven Lagerfeld (Wilson Quarterly).

It may seem implausible to speak of a cult of smarts in the age of Paris Hilton and 30-second political attack ads, when it appears that America is being relentlessly dumbed down. But don’t blame dumb people for that. Dumbing down is the idea of film and television executives, political consultants, newspaper magnates, and other very intelligent people. It’s a shrewd moneymaking strategy. It also reveals one of the problems of putting too much stock in pure brainpower: Smart people are uniquely capable of producing noxious ideas.

The triumph of these canny operators points to the key reason why intelligence has achieved such high status: It’s not so much that brains have risen in our esteem as that other qualities have declined. Intelligence has always been respected and rewarded, but in the past it existed in a larger world of shared values that were intensively cultivated by social institutions. The consensus that supported this system has largely dissolved, and many of the personal and institutional virtues it encouraged have been weakened. But there’s at least one quality about whose goodness we still seem able to agree: raw intelligence. It now enjoys a status akin to virtue.

Mmmm. Much better than yesterday's whining, speaking of which -- D.B. wrote to me about "Mommy Madness" (or stupidity, depending on your perspective):

I much prefer Anna Quindlen's take on things. A good enough mother... one that you can make laugh. I can't even read all of the whining in the other article and on websites such as dooce. I just want to slap them and shout, "Snap out of it."

You know what I think it is... selfishness. [I]t is very unpleasant to be around.

(I am not foolish enough to believe those paper plates are for the child.)

Loving others, especially our husbands and children, is really so much more inspiring.

Ayup.

And I would only add to D.B.'s observations that reading, thinking, writing, learning, laughing, living are more worthwhile pursuits than whining.

Mommy madness, eh?

Over my third cup of coffee yesterday, I read about "Mommy Madness" in the recent issue of Newsweek.

Once my daughters began school, I was surrounded, it seemed, by women who had surrendered their better selves—and their sanity—to motherhood. Women who pulled all-nighters hand-painting paper plates for a class party. Who obsessed over the most minute details of playground politics. Who—like myself—appeared to be sleep-walking through life in a state of quiet panic.

Hand-painting paper plates? Playground politics? Wow. That's not mommy madness; that's mommy stupidity.

On the nightstand (under the pillow, in the knapsack, etc.)

Happy Valentine's Day, readers, thinkers, and autodidacts. I trust you gave and received books and exquisite chocolates. Mmmm. Chocolate. Or perhaps strawberries, large and ripe (Where are they grown this time of year? California?) and delicious, dipped in the finest chocolate and presented when the chocolate is still a little warm.

Mmmmm.

So. Where were we? Oh, yes. Welcome to the fifteenth "On the nightstand" entry. Here are just a few of the books that have became a part of the geography of our imaginations in the last month.

Seven Types of Amibuity (Eliot Perlman)

It is quite well understood that a clinically depressed person will show little, if any, interest in constructive activity concerning future events or outcomes... What he and many people don't understand is that there is more to depression than a sometimes overwhelming feeling of inadequacy and hopelessness and profound sadness. When people are depressed, they are sometimes very, very angry. They are not just quietly miserable. They can be filled with great passion.

Other readers will recognize the title from William Empson's classic study of deft (as opposed to careless) use of literary (or narrative) ambiguity. And Empson's treatise figures not only in the construction of Perlman's novel of obsession, depression, and possession (i.e., the narrative comprises seven related narratives) but also serves to explain Simon's psychological landscape. This is a large, sprawling book that requires "something more" from its readers. I loved it.

Staggerford (Jon Hassler)
In a case of misguided praise, readers of a certain type have pressed Hassler's now thirty-year-old novel on others as something like Jan Karon's Mitford series. Now, I like Karon's books, but Hassler, in this book, anyway, treads not one anticipated path. The same cannot be said of Karon. Moreover, the shadows in the darker corners of Hassler's characters' minds and of his smalltown setting are never fully illuminated, and some of them, it turns out, are quite frightening. I first read this book about twenty years ago. This time around, I learned, among other things, how true it is that books speak to us differently depending on our age and experiences. Highly recommended.

Welcome to Lizard Motel: Children, Stories, and the Mystery of Making Things Up (Barbara Feinberg)
I know how "unreliable narrator" is typically defined, but allow my purposeful (mis)use of the term for this short review. I wanted to like this book well enough to recommend it simply because its premise makes me think -- that is, are the books we press on middle-school readers the sorts of texts that enrich them and grow lifelong readers? But Feinberg is a flighty, clingy narrator, a sort of female Peter Pan, revealed in the first chapter when she is awakened by a dream of painting and drifts onto the porch and decides that it must be painted. Now. I suspect the sequence, and the fact that her children join her in the task without questioning it, is intended as an introduction to our narrator's "artistic nature," her "sensitivity." But you know what? It was all just too weird for me. The way she and her children talk to each other. The way she parks herself under the public library table to think. The way her son tersely refuses to discuss the books he's reading. If I were discussing literature and trends in publishing with someone who spoke and reacted in the ways Feinberg describes herself as speaking and reacting, I'd disengage immediately. In short, I'd find what such a person had to say unreliable, too colored by emotion and too thin on actual data. But perhaps that's just me. Anyway, not recommended... unless, of course, you're actually in the mood for a memoir masquerading as an examination of fiction for young adults.

Gertrude and Claudius (John Updike)
It's commonplace for readers to contemplate how favorite characters would have continued beyond the conclusion of a good (or great) book. But providing the back story? That's trickier stuff. Updike offers us unconventional insights into the characters of Hamlet's parents and uncle (for example, the king, although attentive to his queen, was an unsatisfactory lover) and challenges us to re-examine characters we've dismissed (e.g., Polonius (see M-mv on Polonius)). The character who most benefits from this imagining of the events leading to those that unfold in Shakespeare's Hamlet is, of course, Gertrude. A brilliant characterization. Updike notes that his pre-history was influenced by the vision of Kenneth Branagh's magnificent film. Highly recommended.

Anthem (Ayn Rand)
We covered this here.

The Winter's Tale (Shakespeare)

A sad tale’s best for winter: I have one
Of sprites and goblins....

Yesterday, we arrived just two minutes before the beginning of the Shakespeare Project of Chicago's theatrical reading of The Winter's Tale, but that was enough time to take our seats, hang our coats on the back of our chairs, and peek at the cast notes. It was a terrific afternoon. If you can't see a performance, consider listening while you read.

Big Susan (Elizabeth Orton Jones)
A soft, old-fashioned story by the author of Twig, a favorite of the Misses M-mv. A perfect book for an afternoon like this one.


Briefly noted
Master M-mv (re?)read Phule's Paradise in addition to the books he's been studying (e.g., Anthem and The Winter's Tale). He's reading Michael Crichton's State of Fear and Richard Preston's The Cobra Event.

The Misses M-mv simply want me to note that they reread LeGuin's Catwings stories "among other things." Why the special nod? "Because those books are so! wonderful!" They were pleased to see I had given Twig and Big Susan their props. Peter and the Starcatchers (Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson) and The Wheel on the School (Meindert DeJong) are in their shared queue, the first title being a recommendation from R.T.'s son.

Mr. M-mv finished Dan Brown's Deception Point and is (finally!) onto Ben Macintyre's The Man Who Would Be King: The First American in Afghanistan, an anniversary present from me to him... last year. (M-mv on this terrific book.)

The Human Story: Our History, from the Stone Age to Today (James C. Davis) is in my knapsack, and The Dictionary of Imaginary Places (Alberto Manguel) is on my side of the nightstand.


Recent aquisitions
Art: A New History (Paul Johnson)

His Excellency: George Washington (Joseph Ellis)

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (Jared Diamond)

Gilead (Marilynne Robinson)

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell: A Novel (Susanna Clarke)

The Ugly Dachsund (G.B. Stern)


Previous "On the nightstand" entries
1.14.2005
12.21.2004
11.21.2004
10.12.2004
9.13.2004
8.24.2004
7.19.2004
6.12.2004
5.19.2004
4.22.2004
3.12.2004
2.15.2004
1.26.2004
12.31.2003

Intellectual deficiencies of the autodidact

Facts absorbed without context merely magnify the intellectual deficiencies of the autodidact, because a poorly educated person does not know which facts are important.

Well spoken. And true. But the rest of this review? Right around here -- "A graduate of the prestigious Dalton School in Manhattan and Brown University, Jacobs is a prime example of that curiously modern innovation: the pedigreed simpleton" -- the reviewer loses credibility, having mistaken the author for the text, or vice versa.

For what it's worth, I didn't think the book delivered, either (as I mentioned here), but its failure didn't lead me to damn its author harshly, as the NYT reviewer did.

Far from becoming the smartest man in the world, Jacobs, at the end of his foolish enterprise, wouldn't even be the smartest person at Entertainment Weekly.

Not even the great Flaubert could devise a condemnation harsher than that.

Uh, oh. Mommy-blogging again? Ayup.

Shortly after this post, K.B. wrote to inquire if a link is a recommendation. Good question. You see, Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions was one of two RDAs related to "Stream of consciousness," and my correspondent wanted to how Lamott's book differed from the mommy blogs I deplore.


My reply
Operating Instructions appeared in an uncharacteristic entry[.]

I mentioned that I had been reading it when Kevin was reading Celine's Journey to the End of the Night. It was more narration than recommendation. While I do admire Lamott's Bird by Bird (it's been an RDA, I think), I can easily see the comparison between Operating Instructions and mommy blogging... as did the NYT reporter:

Exposing the dark underbelly of parenthood is not exactly new. Books like Anne Lamott's "Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year" and Andrea J. Buchanan's "Mother Shock: Loving Every (Other) Minute of It" have made it clear that raising children is not all sunshine and sippy cups. What is remarkable is that being a parent has inspired so much text and that so many people seem eager to read it.

What troubles me about mommy blogging? That so much of it is poorly written drivel. That if, in fact, weblogs are a historical record of the everyday (as the NYT suggests), [then] angst-soaked entries about the flu or potty training or whatever will be prevailing message of our time --- not, for example, the pursuit of a rich interior life via reading, thinking, learning; that child- and spouse-bashing, however cleverly written, will represent the common experience of the ordinary mother, not celebration, wonder, merriment. And did I mention that so much of it is poorly written drivel?

Thank you for your message, [K.B.]. I'm glad I make you think. There is no higher compliment since that is the chief aim of making a private pursuit (i.e., autodidacticism) public (via a weblog).


So, is a link a recommendation?
Yes, usually. At the very least, a link is a suggested destination that will make you think. This goes for articles, RDas, websites, etc. Admittedly, the RDA following "Stream of consciousness" was more about tying into the narrative above it (Am I the only one to see that our reading choices quite literally "spoke volumes" about the unrelated paths Kevin and I were navigating that last time we saw each other? Oh, well.) than about pressing a "great book" into your hands. But, generally, I don't link unless (a) the destination is related to the entry; (b) the destination made me think (by offering more information, for example, or offering a new (sometimes controversial or simply different) perspective on a subject; or (c) both (a) and (b).

For the record, Operating Instructions is not an awful book. Lamott, whose narrative voice is bracingly honest and engaging, knows how to wallow in self-pity and celebrate the ordinary, both in clear prose. But I don't need three or three hundred reading experiences like it. Ditto on mommy-blogging, so much of which (and I know I've mentioned this, right?) is, unlike Lamott's text, poorly written drivel.

In another forum I visit...

someone made a point of thanking me for this entry. I mention this because (a) back in October in that same forum, the entry was met with something less than appreciation, and (b) I like the entry, too.

An unrelated aside: Did the news of Arthur Miller's death fill anyone else with sorrow? "To the end of his life, Arthur Miller was working on new material, and thinking about the past," reports the Chicago Tribune. Is work, then, a comfort? Does writing offer solace? Do I want those left to mark my passing to assert, "To the end of her life, she was working on new material, and thinking about the past"? Will it matter what they say? I know now I am old because the passing of talents I admire -- like Jerry Orbach, for example, and now Arthur Miller -- affects me in ways commonly reserved for the people one has known. Death has become personal... even when, arguably, it's not. Goodbye, Mr. Miller.

M-mv on Arthur Miller.

Walking on water

An alarm clock on Sunday? High adventure, despite the gray, gray morning. Yellow boots and red jackets and snacks and tracking books. One of only five cars in the lot. Hello, how are you? Is everyone ready?, then right out into the preserve where we identify tracks --- common, like squirrel, deer, cat, and rabbit; less common, like coyote, mink, and beaver, even vole tunnels. Magic in the chill dark morning: Suddenly, we're led off trail, taught to obscure our break from the path. Through the tamaracks and then out, out onto the marsh. Walking on water! To the island where the herons nest! A reward for early risers. Forty-four nests last year. How many this year? Forty-two? we offer. Another in the party says thirty-nine. Still another, forty-one. So hard to keep one's footing and a steady count, consoles our leader. Trying again as we pick our way back. But no consensus. And then away, away from the tiny island, out onto the marsh again. And onto familiar ground. A briskly beaten trail back to the visitor's center. Good-bye! Take care! See you in a couple of weeks! And on the drive home, we stop to ponder the ineffable sadness an abandoned drive-in movie theater evokes.

"[B]ooks are a great escape."

President Bush's reading habits are described in today's NYT. (Remember: Registration is required to read the NYT online, but it's free and quick.) From "Bush's Official Reading List, and a Racy Omission":

Mr. Bush, who does his reading for pleasure on Air Force One, on weekends and before bed at night, has long said he prefers books to channel surfing, although he does watch television sports.

"I'm reading, I think on a good night, maybe 20 to 30 pages," the president told Brian Lamb of C-Span in an interview at the White House last month. "I'm exercising quite hard these days, and I get up very early, and so the book has become somewhat of a sedative. I mean, maybe there are some other old guys like me who get into bed, open the book, 20 pages later you're out cold."

Mr. Bush added that "in this job, there are some simple pleasures in life that really help you cope. One is Barney the dog, and the other is books. I mean, books are a great escape. Books are a way to get your mind on something else."

Someone is going to have great fun with this article, I think. Book as sedative, eh? Heh, heh, heh.

From the president's reading list

Steven Pinker on gender disparities

From "The science of difference" (The New Republic):

[Harvard President Lawrence] Summers's analysis of why there might be fewer women in mathematics and science is commonplace among economists who study gender disparities in employment, though it is rarely mentioned in the press or in academia when it comes to discussions of the gender gap in science and engineering. The fact that women make up only 20 percent of the workforce in science, engineering, and technology development has at least three possible (and not mutually exclusive) explanations. One is the persistence of discrimination, discouragement, and other barriers. In popular discussions of gender imbalances in the workforce, this is the explanation most mentioned. Although no one can deny that women in science still face these injustices, there are reasons to doubt they are the only explanation. A second possibility is that gender disparities can arise in the absence of discrimination as long as men and women differ, on average, in their mixture of talents, temperaments, and interests--whether this difference is the result of biology, socialization, or an interaction of the two. A third explanation is that child-rearing, still disproportionately shouldered by women, does not easily co-exist with professions that demand Herculean commitments of time. These considerations speak against the reflex of attributing every gender disparity to gender discrimination and call for research aimed at evaluating the explanations.

Pinker is an M-mv fave.

Making Mardi Gras beads

On Saturdays, while Master M-mv teaches in the community swim program ("Screamers [young swimmers who, quite literally, scream their way through the session] are actually easier to teach than those who are simply too frightened to scream," he has observed), Mr. M-mv and I escort the Misses M-mv to a craft class. Some of the projects have been dubious (e.g., a glue project in which participants "dressed" a paper doll as a male or female police office; ayup -- that's it), but most are, if not remarkably creative, then certainly fun, at least to two young children who approach nearly everything with a studied affability and acceptance that confounds most of their peers and enchants just about everyone else.

I love their graceful hands.

This is for the bird(er)s.

Birdwatching.com

And because I don't feel like making a second entry, here are two articles to make you think: "Are Imaginary Companions Good for Kids? What psychologists don't see about pretend friends" (Slate) and "Senses special: The art of seeing without sight" (NewScientist). (A nod to "Magnificent Octopus" for the links.)

It's sunny here. Again. That strange and deceptive sun. But then, no. Not really deceptive, right? The temperature is, after all, climbing every fifteen minutes. The snow quilt is shrinking like an older child's blankie, and the birds are playing like college students on break. But it's a false sense of spring. All right, then. It is deceptive.

Yet deception has its charms, and today, I will yield to them.

This certainly puts it all in perspective.

From "Rabe Ramblings," a post entitled "'To Blog, Or Not To Blog...'":

Everywhere I turn on the Internet, more and more blogs are filled with more and more angst-filled posts about how blogging relates to the rest of some blogger's daily life, whether or not they should continue, the existential import of all of it, blogging goals for the future, why someone is not going to be able to post anything for the next 4 1/2 hours, who's ranked where in the blog "ecosystem," and the future posts someone is planning deep within the recesses of his/her mind for which we are presumably to wait by the computer with anxious anticipation until this veritable cybergold flows from brain to keyboard to internet ether.

Hey, folks, not to burst your bubble, but it's all disposable.

Heh, heh, heh. Hell, even I do that... announce a blogging respite. My concern is motivated more by the market than angst, though. You see, we get good traffic when we post regularly. Good traffic generally translates into a decent number of Amazon clicks. (Listen! There's another one... two... seven.) Enough clicks eventually yield decent sales. Decent sales means more books for Family M-mv. And so it goes. It's really that simple. Announcing a blogging respite is akin to saying, "Gone fishing... but we still want your business. Please." No angst there. But Rabe's point is well taken.

In short, get over yourselves. It's a blog.

(A nod to "Collected Miscellany" for the link.)

"This god, this one word: 'I.'"

Mr. M-mv, Master M-mv, and I selected Ayn Rand's Anthem for our February family book club meeting. It's a slim volume, and all of us finished it well in advance of our suggested deadline, so we met early to discuss it.

In this entry (scroll down to the subhead "What I read today"), I noted that "[w]hen your reading life is as rich as Master M-mv's, text is informed and transformed by the text that came before... and after. And sometimes, introducing characters through rereading is the simplest way to link experiences." How wonderful to discover, in the course of our discussion, that all three of us felt compelled to introduce Equality 7-2521 to other literary characters, many of whom we had discovered together, including Guy Montag of Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, the working beasts of Orwell's Animal Farm and, of course, Harrison Bergeron.

And now Anthem will inform and transform the literary landscape of our readerly imaginations.

A philosophic system is an integrated view of existence. As a human being, you have no choice about the fact that you need a philosophy. Your only choice is whether you define your philosophy by a conscious, rational, disciplined process of thought... or let your subconscious accumulate a junk heap of unwarranted conclusions....
Ayn Rand in Philosophy: Who Needs It

Most folks arrive at Rand via either Atlas Shrugged ("Who is John Galt?") or The Fountainhead ("Howard Roark laughed."). If you haven't already, now, the centennial of her birth, is as good a time as any to discover Rand.


Articles of interest
"Considering the Last Romantic, Ayn Rand, at 100" (yesterday's NYT)

If you love these joyous works, the novels unconvincingly assure us, your worth is certified. If you are left cold by them, then you belong with the looters who try to bring down Roark and drive Halley into exile. The two works are depicted as revolutionary in their threats and promise. The two creators reject their social surroundings and are rejected in turn. Rand's novels have similar aspirations. They too are meant to be monuments to man's spirit, promising his deliverance. They too suffered from rejection (12 publishers turned down "The Fountainhead" before it was published). And for Rand, their reception divided the world into acolytes (her inner circle had a cultic aura) and enemies.

"Rereading 'Atlas' on Ayn Rand's 100th" (Chicago Tribune, January 30, 2005; registration required but free)

Rand, of course, would adore the notion that the novel she began writing six decades ago, right after she'd wrapped up "The Fountainhead" (1943), still is regarded as perilous and possibly even lethal -- lethal, that is, to complacency and lazy thinking and easy goals.

Wednesday marks the 100th anniversary of Rand's birth in St. Petersburg, Russia. She died in 1982 -- at least in the narrow physical sense. Measured across the historical timeline of ideas, however, Ayn Rand ("Ayn" rhymes with "fine," although it's often mispronounced "Ann") remains vibrantly alive. The philosophy she created and espoused in novels, plays and nonfiction treatises still enthralls and disgusts, still intrigues and outrages -- there's no middle ground -- a whole new generation.

Audio
"Book Bag: Marking the Ayn Rand Centennial" (NPR)


Where to begin?
Master M-mv recommends that novitiates begin their reading and learning over at the Ayn Rand Institute. First stop? Introducing Objectivism.

From the incomparable R.T.

Responding to this entry (scroll down to the subhead "Lost in the meritocracy"), R.T. writes:

Hmmm... "Lost in the Meritocracy." How about "Lost in the Funhouse"? John Barth plotted Mr. Kirn's journey forty some years ago. Two different subjects, different times and places, but loads of self-pity, confusion for the main character about where he is going, and along the way a condemnation of a society where nothing is what it seems. Both main characters bewildered and living on instinct, but (finally) honest.

And what's a reader to think? I don't know about others, but I am not surprised that today's institutions of higher learning, and the "best" ones at that, continue to perpetuate the confusion.

But, hey. Isn't it great to be living in a democracy? So many educational choices money can buy, and lo and behold! If you dump loads of money along the way only to discover you were really just faking it along with everybody else, not to worry. A confessional in the Atlantic will serve as your atonement. Then, as this Mr. Kirn did, you can always go back and learn for real.

What was that called? Oh yeah. Homeschooling.

Punxsutawney Phil's prediction

Six more weeks of winter, folks, and that's okay with us. We love winter. Story here.

But the irony is, of course, that shadow, no shadow, it matters not. Approximately six weeks of winter remain, no matter what. Right?

Right.

And, yeah. We were planning a blogging respite, but schedules change, and here we are.

Groundhog Day
Our RDA yesterday (scroll to bottom of entry) and a year ago yesterday: Groundhog Day.

Yogi Berra is credited with "It's deja vu all over again." Groundhog Day is that phrase's cinematic expression. The film precisely (painfully, even; poignantly, certainly) describes the endless loop that self-absorbed middle-age can be -- a sort of deja vu all over again. And again. And again. But Phil the weatherman receives what few of us ever do: the opportunity to play the day over (and over and over) until he gets it. just. right.

Brilliant.

Roger Ebert on Groundhog's Day:

"Groundhog Day" is a film that finds its note and purpose so precisely that its genius may not be immediately noticeable. It unfolds so inevitably, is so entertaining, so apparently effortless, that you have to stand back and slap yourself before you see how good it really is.

Later in that essay, Ebert calls Bill Murray "Hamlet in a sitcom world," noting that Groundhog Day works because Murray is in it, much like Lost in Translation.

Writes Ebert:

Phil is played by Bill Murray, and Murray is indispensable; before he makes the film wonderful, he does a more difficult thing, which is to make it bearable. I can imagine a long list of actors, whose names I will charitably suppress, who could appear in this material and render it simpering, or inane. The screenplay by Danny Rubin and Harold Ramis is inspired, but inspired crucially because they saw Bill Murray in it. They understood how he would be able to transform it into something sublime, while another actor might reduce it to a cloying parable.

Rent it tonight. It will, no doubt, be a better use of your time than just about any other shadow the Great American Campfire is casting on the cave wall.

Making memories
S-t-r-e-t-c-h your brain this afternoon. Skip the boards, the afternoon soaps (yes, we know you look), the entertainment magazines, and the mommy blogs. Read "Making Memories Stick" (Scientific American, January 2005). Read. Think. Learn. Unlike Phil, we only get one chance to get today right.

Don't screw it up.

Chevalier Noir for the Mind

We first developed this idea last April. "The 'Chicken Soup for the [insert target audience]'s Soul' industry leaves us cold," we wrote,

so we're suggesting an alternative: "Chevalier Noir for the Mind" — yes, those chocolate-covered biscuits available at Trader Joe's. (By the way, Joe, a little gift card or corporate discount or basket of goodies or something wouldn't be out of order, given the number of plugs "Mental multivitamin" has given you since its inception, including — hello?!? — the can of French Roast in the opening photo. In fact, don't worry about sending us anything. Just give us a little space in the next "Fearless Flyer." Have your girl call ours, okay?)

We added to the original list of twenty items with entries later in April and then again in July.

And then? Nothing.

Well, it's time to resurrect the list, if for no other reasons than (a) I like the idea (a lot), and (b) I like the photo that accompanied the second and third entries in the series. Heh, heh, heh.

The Chevalier Noir list, then, as it currently stands.

Chevalier Noir for the Reader, Thinker, and Autodidact's Mind
1. Chevalier Noir, of course
2. A Common Reader print catalogue
3. A little person's head against your arm when you're reading aloud
4. Discounts at the bookstore
5. The smell of new books
6. The discovery of an offbeat used bookstore
7. Gift cards to bookstores for birthdays (or Christmas or anniversaries or whatever)
8. Revisiting childhood friends like Trixie Belden, Madeline, All-of-a-Kind Family, and Ratty, Mole, and Badger
9. Introducing those childhood friends to your own children
10. Meeting a fellow reader, thinker, and autodidact
11. The annual book fair at the Newberry Library
12. The Printers Row Book Fair
13. The announcement of any new book by Margaret Atwood, Jane Smiley, Elinor Lipman, John Updike, Kurt Vonnegut, Joyce Carol Oates, Steven Pinker, Simon Winchester... too many more
14. New knapsacks, especially sturdy leather ones with cool pockets
15. Reader's journals
16. Freshly sharpened pencils
17. A clear desk
18. The Underground Grammarian
19. A.W.A.D.
20. The Set daily puzzle (and thank you again, B.)
21. Staying up late to read just one more chapter — and then another
22. Heading to the kitchen for a glass of water and opting instead for a glass of milk — and a Chevalier Noir (or two)
23. Discovering the fading glow of a flashlight beneath the quilt of your now sleeping daughter and a copy of Charlotte's Web on her pillow
24. Heading into Borders for one Joyce Carol Oates book and discovering that she has two new titles
25. Corresponding with a fellow reader, thinker, and autodidact
26. Inter-Library Loan
27. A yellow legal pad and twenty newly sharpened pencils
28. The back-to-school aisle
29. Amazon.com's search engine
30. The Deborah Rowe Radio Show

Only the last item requires editing. Deborah Rowe left WLS sometime after we left Chicago. The station doesn't come in out here, anyway, which is for the best, I guess. Garry Meier's absence was depressing enough. Deborah Rowe? And recently Jay Marvin? These days I find my news and talk elsewhere.

So. What can I add now that the list has been given new life? Hmmm.

31. The Complete Arkangel Shakespeare: 38 Fully-Dramatized Plays
32. "Mental multivitamin" (of course)
33. Othello
34. Bookmarks (I have collected bookmarks from every bookstore I've ever visited and all of the usual sources, too: museums, libraries, literary events.)
35. The Shakespeare Project of Chicago
36. The first page of a new notebook
37. The quarterly email message from Amazon announcing my earnings and providing my gift certificate number (Ayup. We simply buy more books with the money we make here. Many thanks to those readers who make their purchases through links at our site. It's not why we stick with M-mv, but it certainly helps.)
38. The online catalogue for our local library district

More later. We're planning a blogging respite. Oh, wait. The RDA. Same as last year.

The recommended daily allowance
Groundhog Day.

Phil: Well, it's Groundhog Day. Again.


Phil: What would you do if you were stuck in one place and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered?
Ralph: That about sums it up for me.


Phil: Do you know what today is?
Rita: No, what?
Phil: Today is tomorrow. It happened.


Phil: I was in the Virgin Islands once. I met a girl. We ate lobster and drank pina coladas. At sunset we made love like sea otters. That was a pretty good day. Why couldn't I get that day over and over and over?