Dreams, just sold

Dreamworks trailer for Dreamgirls. Stars rise and go, dreams are forever. On the screens December 2006. Yah, Right, see Paramount

in heaven

decay

Pironia

Irony that burns could be called pirony or pyrony. Fire melted with humor. Let's not forget though that pironia is just a butterfly.

in pirony or heck of a job

increase in traffic

This blog is watched. Finally a regular reader ...

in perpetuum spy

Golem or worse

If recognizing yourself in the mirror is the essential difference to being a human...Sometimes I don't recognize myself in pictures. It always takes me years to get accustomed to my decaying.

in heaven

decay

democracy omnia vincit

The Iraqi economy is close to enter a boom phase. What do I say? A boom-boom. Economic bonbon or economic boom-boom.

in good life of saddam

Right is right.

Just watched O'Reilly attacking the Alter article. How can Alter claim that the president actually knows/thinks of himself as a law breaker? Does Alter know what is in Bush's mind? Right so. HIS mind. [ Do you need a mind when you are the result of an intelligent design.]

O'Reilly was purposely misquoting. The exact text is " because he knew that it would reveal him as a law-breaker " which is not exactly the same thing. Nevertheless....
This president thinks this president is always right.
Alter

also in right
intelligent design

Empire and Hubris

The social status of those involved in science and technology is low, hence Kristof is right to discuss the "hubris of the humanities". But he misses a larger point. The economic prospects of those employed in science and technology are low as well.
MBAs beget MBAs, psychologists beget psychologists, lawyers...Managing borrowed money, dealing with depression and suing everybody in sight. Empire.


Kristof
Probably I am wrong and the Roamn Empire had more engineers. Hubris like Spain's in the 1600s.
disasters

bobo bonbon booboo

Discovered a new word- bobo. Savored it. Ten minutes later though discovered that Bobo est mort. Sorry -una lacrima furita.

in david brooks

Slow to come

but now we have a victory plan.

disasters

looking good

My wife sees Saddam on TV today and says "Handsome man. He looks gooood."
Me?.... I worry.

in good life of saddam

impossible

Latest challenge. Get my caption printed in the New Yorker. Ever successful in any my impossible tasks? Don't remember.
Aha. Remembering defeats -next task. Remembering the task- next

in perpetuum perpetum

thanksgiving now?

As a child I hated receiving gifts. Because I had to say "Thanks".

at risk

Noise, my way to relax.... When I cannot sleep, I turn on the TV at C-span. Never used a snoozer...




noise

also in risk

Mrs. Otis Says

In a restaurant yesterday. The orchestra was playing what was the background music of the sixties. Of the elevators I used to take. Then I hated it, but yesterday drank it all. Made me sulk.
in yesterday
Otis

La Machine a Ecrire

Everybody was working on Flame. Telling on Plame. Extraordinary Journalists. High Level Politicians. So busy burying a non-story. Outing - a la maniere de Cocteau. Nobody cared though to check the WMDs.


in cocteau
Plame

when down

with a bad cold, just
show some of your favorite links.

The origin of the word fascination has not been clearly established.

No place to be

Recently several couples we know got divorced. And now "7th Heaven" gets axed.

Only the seventy two virgins seem to keep their attraction ...


in heaven

decay

also in 7th heaven

mistakes and learning from past mistakes

His dad made many mistakes. The proof - his dad did not win a second term. The son has won one.
New lesson. It is not sufficient to criticize your dad.

after the hurricane

My Totyota Camry was stolen one year and one day after I had purchased it. It was known to be the model most likely to be stolen. To prove "them" I was not moved, went back and bought immediately another Camry.
Is New Orleans as steadfast? If they had money?

in hurricanes

gentrification

Paris brûle-t-il?? No, it is the suburbs. La Cité Lumière has lost it's taste for revolution.

in politics of anarchy in Paris

Maybe suburb is a bad choice to translate - too many apartmentent houses? projects?

fit to serve

From the Atlantic
Abraham Lincoln fought clinical depression all his life, and if he were alive today, his condition would be treated as a "character issue"—that is, as a political liability. His condition was indeed a character issue: it gave him the tools to save the nation

Due to his depression he could see the objective reality with a clearer eye. Maybe I know something on this?

disasters

ancient masonry

A collapse I don't need to investigate. Even roman mortar is mortal


in coliseum

decay

google of the day

Today's quote Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. Leo Tolstoy
Look at titles in bookstores. Seems to me that in America nobody thinks of changing the world. Everybody tries to change themselves. And fails.
A dark century after Tolstoy's.

in dark century

in tolstoy

Jumping the waves

Howard Stern has started a series of good bye shows. He is going in a space devoid of gravity. He used to impress me with his sense of humor, with his lack of respect for stupidity. Twenty years ago I could not figure out if he was in control or crazy. Loved him.
In his own, more recent world of strippers he lost most of his sense of humor and thinks his exile is due to censorship.
He goes for a space where uttering obscenities is taken for sense of humor.

in pop
in Howard

the tooth faery

Does the tooth faery exist? This is what the politician seem to discuss when they talk about the administration lying about WMD in Iraq.
Every man on the street knows that this is a war for oil, a pretext to have an army in the Middle East, a war against the Muslim world. But some politicos talk like they did not know. Poor innocent politicos. More dishonest than Bush himself.


in propolitics

got it

For a while my B&N store was out of Didion's book. I got it today. Happy to own another book on death and sickness. So popular -30% off.
in pop

protective mask

Masks are donned to suggest a deeper truth. Or hide the eyes.

Halloween judge

Alito is a good nomination - will allow a debate of ideas. Extremists of all colors are sharpening their knives. Sit back and enjoy the f(l)ight.
in alito

caribou

do I care?
Clarifying story. Yes, economize on oil! but spare the caribou? Drive in the suburbs and meet the deer. And write a poem on the ecological benefits.

in ecology

in caribou

myself

To reach the point you dreamt to be, just to realize what a failure you are.
Myself and Bush and how many more...

shrinking myers

Problems with your daddy? The most intelligent ....
Who's to judge?
Ready for therapy Unhappy Harriet?

in couch

forgotten faust

Nobody cares anymore about eternal youth? or a pact with the devil? Dr. Faust is not relevant anymore? Nobody feels any kinship? Is this a good thing?

claim to fame

Now that the Nobel went to these...Let's stake my claim to fame. The highest score ever in the 20 rounds of "prisoner's dilemma" in the mit/harvard game theory class.

in voila

Metaphysics of self-preservation

Spinoza was writing in a terrible Latin because he was afraid people would understand him.


in latin

Intelligent Design

IN my B&N store a pet section has replaced the engineering stacks. Water overcomes poorly deigned levees and erases an iconic American city. The mayor suggests rebuilding the city on casino money.

in intelligent design or politics of
babes

unreal

The BBC,
Abu Mazen, Bush and god talk
Who said? what?
Who is taking the god's name in vain?
All of them.
in prophets or politics of
right

Fact checking?

Victor Hanson was presenting on C-span his A War Like No Other -the Peloponnesian War. Quite interesting. And then compared human nature with salvage behavior -"like in the recent events in New Orleans" Like any historian of antiquity -believing anything that is written since so little was written.

straight from the idiot's pataphysics

Poor correlations are not the exclusivity of intelligent design coreligionaires

in right

dry heads

After all it is natural to blame Brown. When such a colossal disaster strikes who has the guts to think - I'll take care of it myself? In fact you expect a higher power to pull you out of trouble. Brown was not such power, nor was it he expected to ..

in politics of katrina help

times goes by

No doubt it needs to let employees go. As it devotes its energy to fact check nudging and it starts charging for columnists, the coverage of katrina was the weakest...

nytimes

deja vu

Isn't it the story of the mujadeens in Afganistan?

in hurricanes or politics of
terrorirsm

to the stones' show in a limo

There is no other proper way to go there -someone like me who know but one of their songs - Satisfaction.
It was a pleasure though seeing Keith Richards meandering thru the stage - and only great moment Keith stopping to sing - I am the worst. Forty years of rock. Still being there almost to the end of the rock's age. In this world of broken marriages. A piece of history.

in stones

falling between left and right

failing between left and right.
Lack of common purpose might doom the reconstruction. The two ineffectual parties. Politicians- paper tigers, paper leaders. Facts cannot sustain the political dogma. No personal responsibility. No conservative like in conservation and no compassion.

in hurricanes
in politics of katrina

going there

I am about to go down South. If I can find the means I will post from there.
Four years ago was making a similar travel. One of the strongest memories - the shock created by the fast transition from a city where life was close to routine to that horrific WTC ruins.

in politics of katrina help

et a la fin de l'envoy je touche 

poker faces

Risk and reward. This is what any MBA learns. Or financial analyst. Expected value.
The risk was known. The probabilities were known. The cost was estimated.
The locals did not wan to make the calcs. Some of them still don't.
The technicians hid their calculations. Or introduced " the days of our life" in the equation.
The politicians - did not see votes in this. Moving dirt in the Big Easy?
Is there anyone not sleeping well now? Besides the evacuees? Is there anyone else uncomfortable? How can we know?
The put their poker faces on.
We lost [using good management skills]

in hurricanes
in politics of katrina

don't shoot the cashier

Imagining the agency's name is related to the function I attended a FEMA meeting about seven years ago. Clinton's FEMA. It was just talk of grants. How to apply for money. This is the main function of FEMA. Transfers money from the federal government to the public or the states. Occasionally helps supplement the technical needs of a locality. It is a claims adjuster.
Seems that the public,even the informed one, makes the same mistake I made. Definitely FEMA is not about management. Maybe knowhow. Maybe some. The mayor should not be exempt from blame. Nagin was checking with his staff the Saturday before the hurricane if he can order a mandatory evacuation. How come he was not prepared to answer this?
in hurricanes
in politics of katrina

scarred and scared.

Coming at 7 pm thru Lincoln Tunnel. Almost no traffic -Labor Day.
I don't know? People are scared? Or sad? A different tomorrow?
When you see so many people who lost everything. When you see senators crying on TV. When you see Donna Brazile talking about her sister. Do we have a sand castle that started to crumble? Ineptitude or irresponsibility? Lack of human empathy?
All those who had had a great time for a weekend in New Orleans. Reminescing. They never saw New Orleans, never guessed all those stranded in the dome.
The Times reports the Bronx is the poorest county in the country. Reminiscing about New York...
in hurricanes

in politics of katrina

A member of the family

My dog died Saturday morning. Over the night he could not sleep, breathing fast.
A beautiful Maltese, only ten years old. He did not like long walks, but when we were going out together-wife, daughter and myself- he was proud to lead us. Our little pack. No more now.

role? or part?

don't criticize him. They just forgot to tell him what his role was. Is it just a part? [stars get roles, starlets get parts]
Even Fox criticized today- The president should not have been so unhappy with the response. Things are going pretty much OK.in hurricanes

in politics of katrina