So I’ve been rebuilding a classic British road bike for the last few months. (It doesn’t actually take months to do this, unless you only work on it every few weeks for a couple hours at a time and without knowing what you’re doing.) About a month ago, I thought I had it all set, [...]
Archive for the ‘Technology’ category
Thank you, and good night
It was September 10, 2001 and this guy Bill who I found aloof and brittle but who served as a makeshift friend during a pretty lousy year asked if I wanted to go see Laurie Anderson the next evening. As you may have heard, some shit went down the next morning, and we both decided [...]
Pinned
As a kid, I saved Cracker Jack wrappers and vintage glass insulators from the tops of telephone poles. As an adult, my house is littered with baskets of Cape Cod sea shells, fabric from every quilt store east of the Mississippi, a Big Gulp cup full of wine corks with “cool branding,” a shelf of [...]
Umbrellas, lost and broken
Why is the humble umbrella such a conundrum? Can we not come up with a design that can open, close, fit in a purse, and withstand a certain degree of bluster? Having spent a day battling New York winds and rains, I am stumped at the imperfections of this essential object. I propose that we [...]
What’s news?
This afternoon I was reading the LA Times on line, catching up on Frank McCourt’s latest flailing attempts to maintain control of the Dodgers. When I was done, I scrolled to the bottom and glanced at the links there. Sometimes I’ll make my way through the news like this, instead of returning to the homepage [...]
We’re lame!
Or not. I don’t know. How can we be sure? Even though the premise seems like a set-up for easy present-bashing in favor of a twisted nostalgia for a period when new music was, you know, good, I’m looking forward to reading Simon Reynolds’ recent book, Retromania. Part of the blurb on Amazon makes it [...]
Post
This post is in response to Stella’s post from last Friday. It is not an argument against anything that Stella wrote, but I was inspired by the subject and some of the comments. Before I go on any further, I should tell you that I’m actually writing this post as a spoken piece which is [...]
The written words
Once, the tools of writing were precious. People had to invent paper. Use chalk on slate. Carve stone with hieroglyphics. Prepare calf vellum. Make ink. Even growing up in the 70s, pencils, pens, felt tips, chalks, crayons and pads of paper were celebrated birthday and Christmas gifts. Then, those things become cheap and plentiful. And [...]
