Black Friday, Shopping, Christmas

Thanksgiving managed to hold its place until about 3pm on Thursday, so presumably many people bolted their turkey and pie and left the table scraps to congeal in order to get to the shops on time.

I have a theory about this.

It’s not about the bargains. It’s not really about Christmas or Hanukkah for most people. [...]

Popularity

I had to go away for a few days and my laptop decided to refuse to cooperate once I got there.  On my return my laptop decided to behave, and I discover 1412 Spam messages waiting for me (safely in my spam collector, thank goodness).

Most of the spam messages are illiterate, and, if they are [...]

Republican candidates? Fail

The Republican candidates have shown themselves to be almost alarmingly uniform in their mediocrity. Between Cain the groper who has no grip on US Middle East policy, to Perry’s brain freeze, to Bachmann’s wackiness we could have hoped for something a bit more exciting, at least in terms of actual ideas.  But no. We saw [...]

Worth a look

http://vimeo.com/31158841?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=link&utm_campaign=SocialMedia

31158841?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=link&utm_campaign=SocialMedia

Good Bye Signor Berlusconi

Silvio Berlusconi has finally resigned as Premier of Italy, after a 17 year career that has to rival the emperor Caligula for corruption and lunacy. In Greece the prime minister, George Papandreou has also stepped aside.  The stock markets surge in happy response.

Except for one small thing.  The people who put, and kept, those two [...]

Cultivate Wonder

When I first came to the United States, 25 years ago, I used to wander around thinking how cool it felt to be living in what felt to me like a movie script. The commute to work was like being in something I used to pay to watch in the movie house.

Gradually that sense, child-like [...]

Surprised by Beauty

There’s plenty of beauty about. It just seems to keep popping up in unexpected places, usually when I’m already late and a bit frazzled, as if to say - take a look at this, my friend!

The thing about beauty, though, is that it opens us up to thinking about other things — larger, finer, better [...]