Latest Parries
June 2013
Go Deny Yourself
This little four-letter word undermines our modern values of tolerance and presumption of innocence.
December 2012
Some Consumer Affairs
I’ve tried to enjoy schlepping water, thinking that it serves to keep us to some human roots.
April 2012
From Nokia N95 to iPhone 4S
Annoyances and upsets with the iPhone 4S have been more than offset by its screen, the silkiness of its surfaces, the camera, and the third-party market for both software and hardware.
February 2012
2001: A Space Odyssey: Dry, Juicy, Linear, Luminous
After they finished watching the Bond movies, I figured the next series John Gruber and Dan Benjamin would discuss on The Talk Show would be Stanley Kubrick’s oeuvre. But Gruber refused — too personal for podcasting, he said. Disappointed, I rewatched 2001.
January 2012
A Scheme of a Number of Friends
Instead of acknowledging the wisdom of leading from behind, the Right jumped on the Obama administration’s handling of Libya as yet another example of at best incompetence. They lost me there.
October 2011
The Mouse and the Cantilever
Steve Jobs we lost at the age of 56; when Frank Lloyd Wright reached that age it was still only 1923, the time of merely his second comeback with Tokyo’s Imperial Hotel.
March 2010
Friendship is for Weenies
It’s amazing, given the adulation he enjoyed elsewhere, that the Israeli public knew from the start not to trust this US President.
Before the Setup
Nobody from usesthis.com has asked me what my setup us, nor is likely to anytime soon. So I’m just going to mouth off here about it. But first, some background.
February 2010
Walter Russell Mead steps gingerly into the Wieseltier/Sullivan imbroglio
On the Leon Wieseltier/Andrew Sullivan spat, Walter Russell Mead seems to want to have his strudel and eat it too.
October 2009
My Hope: Obama’s Change
Defeat in the Olympics bid may focus the mind in the Oval Office where it should be: Afghanistan.
T oday’s main bit of writing seems to be by Dean Barnett, co-blogger to the rather accomlished Hugh Hewitt, speaking to Elizabeth Edwards’ cancer. Barnett has cystic fibrosis so can relate to a tough disease. The money quote:
I think I may know some of what the Edwards are feeling. They’ve been running for the White House for seven years now. And make no mistake – as Hugh points out in his book, running for president is a family affair. It’s more than a dream and an ambition for them. It’s a big part of what defines their lives.
So they walked out of that doctor’s office refusing to let her disease take their lives away. Some people are calling their decision courageous; others find it puzzling. Having been in a situation analogous to theirs, I think I have some understanding and I know I have some sympathy. They’re working through all of this. Their first instinct is not to surrender. That’s good, and it’s what you would have expected. People who seek the presidency aren’t the types who give up or even compromise easily.
James Taranto at The Wall Street Journal blockquoted much of it and Hewitt read the whole thing aloud; “Just about perfect pitch,” Hewitt says. “You can’t stop being who you are,” he writes, speaking from personal experience, as many members of his own family have had cancer. “Don’t blame Edwards from continuing to campaign; it’s what he does.” I’m surprised, actually, at Hewitt’s positive reaction, as he doesn’t like Edwards. But though he can come across as a bludgeon, Hewit is a subtle guy really; you can’t be as smart and well-honed as he is without being subtle.
He’s saying he watched the Clintons on TV the previous night and Bill is all gaunt and papery and Hillary is God-awful. I wrote that last week; there’s no way she’s going to get the nomination. The moment people stop and imagine life with her as president they’ll say, nice idea, a woman, but not this one, not this time, not yet. She can’t win, Hewitt argues, because she’s so awful on television. His guest Mark Steyn meanwhile argues that Bill is always on, sincerely phony, but Hillary is not like that, though she did become almost charming after months of practice while campaigning for her Senate seat.
Just watched Merlin Mann interview John Vanderslice wherein Merlin says he’s 40. I was wondering. There’s something 27 about him as well. What’s he been doing all these years I wonder.
All my web celebrities. Mark Steyn is on still. Well not really, as I’m listening to The Hugh Hewitt Show as a podcast via iTunes. They’re discussing Al Gore. “Sanctimonious… Humbug. Hypocrite… Just the glow from his self-satisfaction must be contributing to global warming.” Hewitt: “Marvelously entertaining.” (Gore, not Steyn’s description of him, which is entertaining but not quite marvelously.)
I’m pleased that my off-the-cuff response to the Edwards announcement a couple of days ago was pretty much on the ball with these more careful, public and smart thinkers. So you can rely on me, you see?
I’m fishing around for directions to take Parries. You can’t really get too personal in a blog can you? The purpose is to be able to relate things that happened to you during the day that resonate universally. Another purpose is personal, for me to have a record of some kind of all the days, weeks, months, years that pass. A chronicle for me of my daily life. The trick is to integrate the immediate and personal with the general and universal. In a word, Fridgeblogging (more), as Lileks coined it.
My uncle was on television today reading the statement on the second story of the day, the cricketer’s murder in Jamaica.
Previously
My Top Stories of the Day
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Fast Food