All I can do is reply on my own behalf, realizing that what I say is relative. Accepting the absurdity of everything around us is one step, a necessary experience: it should not become a dead end. It arouses a revolt that can become fruitful. An analysis of the idea of revolt could help us to discover ideas capable of restoring a relative meaning to existence, although a meaning that would always be in danger. —-Albert Camus
Gustave Caillebotte
French 1848-1894
Portrait of Paul Hugot
1878
Houston Museum of Fine Arts
Impostor syndrome isn’t always a voice of unwarranted self-doubt that you should stifle. Sometimes, it is the voice of God telling you to stand down. —-Walter Russell Mead
A skill I learned in school – unfortunately, that was a half-century ago and it’s a skill I’ve lost. Should I work and regain it? I’m kicking up my reading and most of the books I read (fiction and non) would benefit from some marginalia.
There could be a psychopath sitting next to you right now.
But it fell later as they tried to move another piece. Note the rare “suspended section” of blocks. I’m not sure of the physics of leaving a few behind for a handful of microseconds.
There are only two kinds of people who do not experience painful emotions. The first kind are the psychopaths. The second kind are dead. There is a false understanding or expectation that a happy life means being happy all the time. No. Learning to accept and even embrace painful emotions is an important part of a happy life. —–Tal Ben-Shahar, The Happiness Paradox
Riverbank Sculpture, Mississippi River, French Quarter, New Orleans
A growing body of research shows that the pursuit of happiness actually makes us miserable. This paradoxical finding likely results from people setting impossibly high standards, excessively monitoring their happiness, and misunderstanding what will make them truly happy. Positive psychologist Tal Ben-Shahar says that to be happier, we must find ways to pursue it indirectly while also accepting painful emotions.
Skateboarders regularly fail at their chosen activity. But that doesn’t make it a meaningless task of Sisyphean proportions
In the US talk show Comediansin Cars Getting Coffee (2012-19), the host Jerry Seinfeld remarks in a conversation with Chris Rock that ‘Those skateboard kids … are going to be all right.’ Rock expresses his agreement with Seinfeld, and they quickly move on to other topics. Their discussion about the value of skateboarding is quite brief (lasting about 20 seconds). But they agree that skateboarding provides skaters with a means of learning a life lesson. The lesson follows from the success of the skater in executing a manoeuvre after repeatedly failing (and falling). While some may nod their heads in agreement, it is worth considering whether Rock and Seinfeld are right. Does skateboarding teach a life lesson? If it does, is it a valuable lesson? Going further, why should we think that skateboarding is not, in fact, a meaningless activity that lacks any value?
The strongest passion in humans is not hunger, sex or power, although these are quite strong; the very strongest passion is laziness. The longer I study human beings, including myself, the more I am inclined to agree. Laziness is the strongest passion.” —-Carl Jung
The interesting thing in this article is that we aren’t only one person – we are a series of different personalities – changing over time.
The British philosopher Derek Parfit espoused a severely reductionist view of personal identity in his seminal book, Reasons and Persons: It does not exist, at least not in the way we usually consider it. We humans, Parfit argued, are not a consistent identity moving through time, but a chain of successive selves, each tangentially linked to, and yet distinct from, the previous and subsequent ones. The boy who begins to smoke despite knowing that he may suffer from the habit decades later should not be judged harshly: “This boy does not identify with his future self,” Parfit wrote. “His attitude towards this future self is in some ways like his attitude to other people.”
That’s really interesting… even apart from procrastination (ie, why do something when you can delegate it to your future self – who is sort of a different person, even a stranger). I have to think about the implications of considering my future self as a stranger. To extend the thought, do we think about our past selves as strangers? Should we?
Another thought?
Of course, the way we treat our future self is not necessarily negative: Since we think of our future self as someone else, our own decision making reflects how we treat other people. Where Parfit’s smoking boy endangers the health of his future self with nary a thought, others might act differently. “The thing is, we make sacrifices for people all the time,” says Hershfield. “In relationships, in marriages.” The silver lining of our dissociation from our future self, then, is that it is another reason to practice being good to others. One of them might be you.
Yes, I am a worrier. I worry too much about things I can’t stop – though I usually worry because I know there are things I can do to prepare and/or protect but I can’t really figure out what those thing are or what they should be. As I get old my worrying is getting a lot better though not for good reasons. I worry less because I don’t give a shit anymore.
One thing I have always worried about is the Yellowstone Supervolcano. Over the years I have looked at potential ash depths to see how much would make it to the Dallas area. Not smart – not healthy.
So, according to the linked article, nothing will happen in the next year at least.
Strike up a conversation every day Ask Interesting Questions Follow Your Curiosity Take Yourself on Dates Listen to Good Podcasts Open Yourself Up to Other Perspectives Tap Into Your Unique Passions
“An entire life spent reading would have fulfilled my every desire; I already knew that at the age of seven. The texture of the world is painful, inadequate; unalterable, or so it seems to me. Really, I believe that an entire life spent reading would have suited me best. Such a life has not been granted me…” ― Michel Houellebecq, Whatever
One Toke Over the Line
I don’t know what we were talking about but an odd thing came up in conversation (maybe online, maybe IRL) – that the song “One Toke Over the Line” was once performed on the Lawrence Welk show. I did some research to make sure that this was true and not some modern deepfake (It would be hilarious if it was) – but nope, it really did happen. Lawrence Welk himself described the song as a “modern spiritual.” Yeah… I guess it was. Wikipedia says Welk later claimed that ABC had forced him to play the misplaced song, as its executives had been pressuring Welk into including more contemporary material that Welk did not want on his show.
But even somebody as old-school as Lawrence Welk… what the hell did he think “toke” meant?
In reading about it, one take I found hilarious is pointing out that a lot of the musicians working on the Welk show were big-time session players and they all definitely knew what the song was about – they would have been laughing their asses off.
I know that some (most) of y’all are way too young to know about Lawrence Welk. I am old enough that I clearly remember the show airing – my grandparents generation loved, LOVED that show. It was so old-fashioned, so straight-laced… yet it had some odd underlying sexual tension… or at least I thought it did.
At any rate it was not the show to feature drug songs. And, of course, in this day and age, YouTube comes to the rescue. Here is the song, a little blurry, but still wonderful, wonderful.
“If life is an illusion it’s a pretty painful one.” ― Michel Houellebecq
Writing in my Moleskine Journal outside the Mojo Lounge, Decatur Street, French Quarter, New Orleans
Why writing by hand is better for remembering things
Of course I (and you) already knew this – but it’s good to be reminded. I remember in college in a moment of desperation I decided to cheat on an exam. I wrote out notes on tiny scraps of paper – struggling to make minute scribbles that I could still read – minuscule enough to conceal from the test-givers. Yeah, I know that’s cheating, and immoral… but it was a moment of hopeless weakness.
But once I completed the task I realized I didn’t need the notes anymore. It was so much work to copy then in their Lilliputian form, I had to concentrate so intently (my handwriting is terrible, btw) that the information was burned into my memory (at least for a day or so).
In the years to come that became another study technique for me. I would accumulate the most important information and recopy it – but as small and legible as I could – slowly, and with great effort. Then I throw the notes away.
It really worked.
“It is in our relations with other people that we gain a sense of ourselves; it’s that, pretty much, that makes relations with other people unbearable.” ― Michel Houellebecq, Platform
The chronological passage of the hours, days, and years on clocks and calendars is a steady, measurable phenomenon. Yet our perception of time shifts constantly, depending on the activities we’re engaged in, our age, and even how much rest we get.
Ayahuasca is a psychoactive, or hallucinogenic, plant-based tea native to the Amazon, where it has a centuries-long history of healing use in traditional medicine, according to the article.
But contemporary ritual use of ayahuasca has been expanding worldwide for mental health purposes and spiritual and personal growth.
Our nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) is running dangerously low. New statistics released indicate our national emergency oil stockpile, which is intended to protect the United States from unexpected and severe supply disruptions, has hit another historic low. It’s a dangerous point for the United States, and even worse, it’s self-inflicted.
After having done her stalwart best for the Covid Crusade for more than two years – demonizing those who refused to get the vaccination or wear masks everywhere, or see our children locked out of school, or who suggested that ivermectin or chloroquine might alleviate the symptoms – Professor Oster now is suggesting that … really, it was all just a silly misunderstanding, she and her pals just got carried away but they meant well and didn’t know anything for certain, and why can’t we all just all forgive and forget?
More than two years since the lockdowns of 2020, the political mainstream, particularly on the left, is just beginning to realize that the response to Covid was an unprecedented catastrophe.
Fountainhead, Charles Long, Northpark Center Dallas, Texas
A recent study conducted by MIT’s Sloan School of Management found that a toxic workplace culture is the number one reason people leave their jobs and is 10.4 times more likely to contribute to attrition than compensation.
I think it is important to point out that it isn’t that jobs are toxic – it’s that management is toxic.
A friend of mine from high school is an avid cyclist in Santa Fe. His two cameras caught him involved in a “right hook” accident – a very common hazard for cyclists (probably second only to getting “doored”). Be careful out there folks.
This is three years old – but I came across it again – it’s one of my favorite on-air rants – for several reasons. “Living in Bananaland.” Hah.
High-profile initiatives to plant millions of trees are being touted by governments around the world as major contributions to fighting climate change. But scientists say many of these projects are ill-conceived and poorly managed and often fail to grow any forests at all.
In the ’90s, Microsoft created an annoying paperclip that it quickly retired. Its developers never imagined the virtual assistant would become a cultural icon.
One of the cool things is that you could go down into a pit area and look at what was left of the vehicles after they ran their race. If their was enough left in one piece you could even sit in the driver’s seat and get your picture taken.
Or you could talk to the drivers. For some reason this driver, from a cheese-wedge shaped car that made it down quickly in one piece, seemed very popular in the pits.
It’s not just a moment. If you have speaking anxiety, it can take up to 20 minutes for the parasympathetic system to intervene and return you to a state of calm. Here are some practical ways to tackle it before it gets the best of you.
What does a car made in Wolfsburg, Germany, have to do with a novelty hit from 1961? It’s a strange tale, with musical connections to Dolly Parton, the Mamas and Papas, a children’s cartoon and an iconic scene from a famous 1980s movie. It’s about a boy from Brooklyn.
It really is all about the sauce. How can you not love anything that has both Sriracha and Wasabi in squirt bottles?
American culture is as brilliant, stimulating and creative as it has ever been.
That statement goes against the talk of decline that is heard regularly among journalists and philosophers, especially on the Right. Yet it’s not American culture that has failed. It’s our cultural gatekeepers.
Recently on a hot mic during his visit to Florida, President Joe Biden told Fort Myers Mayor Ray Murphy, “Nobody F***s with a Biden.” As PJ Media’s Kevin Downey Jr. pointed out, even inanimate objects f*** with Joe Biden. Now, Saudi Arabia is taking their shot.
Mouth Mask Probably Depicting the Head of a Rooster
Indonesia: Southeast Moluccas, Leti, Luhuleli
19th Century
Wood, Boar Tusks, Clam Shell, Mother-of-Pearl, buffalo horn, resinous material, and pigment
Dallas Museum of Art
It’s been over a year since “two weeks to slow the spread,” and the pandemic is finally dragging to a finish. Cases are down, herd immunity has more or less arrived, and even in deep-blue Boston, Stop & Shop has announced it will end mask requirements before the month’s out.
A major survey into the accuracy of climate models has found that almost all the past temperature forecasts between 1980-2021 were excessive compared with accurate satellite measurements.
Bill Chance 