Overheard in my back yard over the course of several hours on New Year’s Day:
“Why do you think that Cripple Creek song is stuck in my head?”
“You mean ‘Up on Cripple Creek she sends me’?”
“No, I mean like Neil singing ‘Hey hey, Cripple Creek ferry.’”
“What is Cripple Creek anyway?”
“Want me to Google it?”
“Nah. [...]
Archive for the ‘Mind & Brain’ category
Lazin’ on a sunny afternoon
Hearing what you think, wondering what you heard
I had one of my weird Buffy the Vampire Slayer moments this week. This happens when ordinary life collides with pretend life and I seem to be the only one who notices. It is unsettling, like waking up and walking around only to wake up again and realize that the first waking was a dream.
It started with the weather [...]
I Wish I Had A River
She wears diapers. She eats with her fingers, and wears a bib. When prompted she will use a fork or a spoon, but often the food ends up on her clothes or the floor. She’s mostly non-verbal. She can’t walk, although with assistance she can take a few steps. She spends most days sitting [...]
All in
Back when I lived in Washington, Stella and I used to join a few friends for poker evenings. We’d get a bottle of scotch, a pack of cards and some poker chips, and spend a couple of hours chatting and playing Texas Hold ‘em. These evenings were usually more about conversation than about serious cards, [...]
Birthday Cake
Today I’m going to bake a carrot cake for Parrish. Parrish loves carrot cake, and tomorrow is her birthday.
The recipe comes from The Good Housekeeping Illustrated Book of Desserts.
I’ll start by grating 2 cups of carrots.
While I grate the carrots, I’ll start thinking about the last time I baked a cake the day before [...]
Pure murderous fun
There’s nothing the English like better than a good murder mystery. We have produced the kings and queens of the genre from Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers to Ruth Rendell, P.D. James and Dick Francis. In fact, on Amazon there is a sub-category of British Detectives. We are also [...]
Thursday playlist: Ringing singing all the way
1. Django — Modern Jazz Quartet
2. Tahquamenon Falls — Sufjan Stevens
3. Blue Stamp — Anderegg
4. Bells 1 — Born out of Moonshine
5. Suite No. 6 in D, Prélude, by J.S. Bach — Mstislav Rostropovich
So I spent last week and most of the week before that at a ten-day silent meditation retreat of the sort so [...]
In memoriam ad infinitum
As someone who’s a little death-obsessed, I’ve spent a fair amount of time contemplating the mourning process. I’ve wondered about its origins: is it a natural reaction (as some suggest is the case with many species) or a social construct? I’ve also thought about whom it serves: should it be a private or [...]
Pure puzzling fun
I used to live in London in a neighborhood called Wood Green. I lived off Lordship Lane, a major thoroughfare. Many years before I lived there, a company called Universal Publications Ltd. thrived at 581 Lordship Lane by producing the latest in party games. In a pre-TV world, people were hungry for new ways of [...]
Teeth and sky
I went on a river tour this weekend in Chicago. I listened to the names of the architects, learned the differences between art deco, post modern, neoclassical, buildings referential to their surroundings and those not, anecdotes of moguls who wanted to sit higher and see farther than their competition. Yet in the end, all that [...]
