talbotlucas.org: a word to the wise is sufficient

unprecedented, i think

The New Yorker has clearly taken a side--an unprecedented step, I believe--in the upcoming presidential election.

Please vote next Tuesday. For better or worse we've refrained from a good deal of political commentary on the talbotlucas blog (or perhaps bitten our tongues would be more accurate), but that may change after next Tuesday. Some races may seem like choices between evils, but just make the best decision you can--really think about these--and exercise your right.

If you don't and you tell us you didn't, we're not going to put up with any of your complaints...

agents' trustworthiness (or not)

Say what you will about The Defamer, but its coverage of the Disney/Michael Ovitz trial is among the more amusing commentary you'll find. Discussing the testimony from Disney executive and others who said (essentially) that Michael Ovitz was untrustworthy, and that they did not trust him, even though they hired him and paid him incredible sums. The Defamer observes:

How could any of them been surprised that the biggest agent in town might have some difficulties telling the truth? Hiring an agent and expecting him not to lie is like hiring a hooker and expecting her to pay you to dress up like Seabiscuit and wear a saddle all night. Or, you know, so we hear. It seems that we're all going to learn some hard lessons in the course of this trial.

Well, yes.

But if you think The Defamer is being too harsh on the agent community, just look at what they reserved for entertainment lawyers: "Entertainment lawyers? They're like agents with the blackened hearts removed." Hmm...

happy birthday, a.j. liebling

A.J. Liebling would have celebrated his 100th birthday today. He's not around to do so, but many people aren't letting that detail stop them. Journalist, contributor to the New Yorker, and "formidable eater," he loved Paris and wrote about it and its food lovingly in Between Meals. The New Yorker has posted a great piece by David Remnick on its web site--it's both a great introduction and a lovely reminder of Liebling and his contributions.

our national eating disorder

Interesting observations from Michael Pollan in today's New York Times Magazine on the waves of national food phobias. Here's the link to the article (and click here if the link doesn't work).

olive ridley turtles

I've written of my warm feelings toward hippos, and in a way, sea turtles fall into the same pot of affection: They're ungainly on land, graceful in water, and they often need protection from humans with bad intentions. This was definitely the case with the olive ridley turtles, which were on the verge of extinction.

The New York Times had a great article this week (from which the picture comes--click on it for a larger view) about how the Mexican government has taken a few steps to make sure the turtles are unharassed during their egg-laying season, and how this has helped bring the species back from the brink. (Try here if the link has expired.) The photo of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of turtles making their way onto the beach was such a pleasing sight that I kept it on my desktop and found myself opening it quite often this week.

"but i might learn somethng if i read that..."

Horrors, I know. This isn't a quote from me, but from a conversation recounted on Seth Godin's blog, which I've been reading more often lately via NetNewsWire. NNW is a very cool app from Ranchero, and lives up to its tagline: "More news, less junk, faster."

i've been sitting on a lot of posts

Meaning that I've been bookmarking and making a lot of notes about things I wanted to mention here, but haven't for one reason or another. These are starting to weigh on my (as does most of my "to do" list) so here comes the miniwave of posts...

have you read all these books?

Many thanks to the Crescat Sententia team for reminding me of Umberto Eco's wonderful essay, "How to Justify a Private Library" (from A Passion for Books). For those who have a lot of volumes at home and often get the "did you really read all these" question, Eco advises:

[For] people who possess a fairly sizable library (large enough in my case that someone entering our house can't help but notice it; actually, it takes up the whole place.), visitors enter and say, "What a lot of books! Have you read them all?" At first I thought that the question characterized only people who had scant familiarity with books . . . but there is more to it than that. I believe that, confronted by a vast array of books, anyone will be seized by the anguish of learning and will inevitably lapse into asking the question that expresses his torment and his remorse.

In the past I adopted a tone of contemptuous sarcasm. "I haven't read any of them; otherwise, why would I keep them here?" But this is a dangerous answer, because it invites the obvious follow-up: "And where do you put them after you've read them?" The best answer is the one always used by Roberto Leydi: "And more, dear sir, many more," which freezes the adversary and plunges him into a state of awed admiration. But I find it merciless and angst-generating. Now I have fallen back on the riposte: "No, these are the ones I have to read by the end of the month. I keep the others in my office," a reply that on the one hand suggests a sublime ergonomic strategy and on the other leads the visitor to hasten the moment of his departure.

Love that.

it hurts to even think about it

Today's SFGate features an article about the new mosaic at the entrance to the Livermore public library. So far, so good. But then we learn that of the 175 names on the wall (artists, scientists, other luminaries), eleven are misspelled. Einstein is spelled "Eistein," Shakespeare is spelled "Shakespere," Gauguin is spelled "Gaugan"...the SFGate has kindly provided a chart of the misspellings.

The city of Livermore is having the artist return to correct the mosaic. The article notes, though, that:

...she [artist Maria Alquilar] was unapologetic about the blunders when she told the Associated Press that others present when the mosaic was installed should have caught them. Besides, she said, it's art. "The people that are into humanities, and are into (William) Blake's concept of enlightenment, they are not looking at the words," she said. "In their mind, the words register correctly."

So, um, we're somehow unenlightened if we think spelling names correctly is important? I could see if phonetic spelling or some other twist was intended by the artist as part of the commentary of the mosaic, but the article goes on to note that "City officials who pointed out the errors to Alquilar said she seemed to have no idea the names were spelled incorrectly." As if my head didn't hurt enough already...wow.

Postscript: The SFGate now reports that the artist is refusing to return to Livermore to make the corrections.

Update, 14 October: The artist has been persuaded to return to Livermore and to correct the misspellings.

nobel for literature, 2004

This year's recipient of the Nobel Prize in literature is Elfriede Jelinek, an Austrian writer.

the Buchmesse begins!

Today was the opening day of the annual Frankfurt Book Fair. I used to attend, and though I don't miss the stale air, cigarette smoke, or the surly attendants at the vending stands, I do miss the camaraderie, seeing "Frankfurt friends" (sitting across a table, even a teeny tiny one in a booth, is better than fax and email), and the history of it all.

Frankfurt is a rights fair, meaning that publication and ancillary rights are bought and sold, or at least offered and considered. Over several days, 6,691 individual exhibitors from 110 countries present more than 350,000 titles to fellow publishers; on the weekend, the public can purchase tickets and be admitted for a peek at some of the titles that will be hitting store shelves in the coming months. We don't have anything like it here--the BookExpo show is primarily a sales event, not a rights event--and I'm hoping that I'll be able to take Terrence to the Fair one day so he can see firsthand what all the hubbub is about.

There's also a nice temporal tie-in with the announcement of the Nobel Prize for literature, and the publisher(s) of the winning author tend to get a lot of business and genuine congratulations. One doesn't know going to the Fair who the winner will be, so there's a bit of suspense that adds to the excitement. The announcement is scheduled for tomorrow (1:00pm Stockholm time at the earliest says the Nobel web site)...

migraine reading

Having been hit with another migraine which rendered most of yesterday afternoon and all of yesterday evening completely useless, I went out this morning--much clearer of mind--and purchased two books on migraine: one philosophical/historical, and one practical.

The first is by one talbotlucas favorite, Oliver Sacks. As noted in the foreword by William Gooddy:

The afflication of migraine has been described for at least the past 2,000 years; and no doubt every generation of modern man, with his history of perhaps 250,000 years, has its experience in this constellation of disorders. Yet it is a very common opinion of the public and the medical profession that little is known about migraine and even less to be done about it. . . . In no other condition may we find the complete physiological experiment in a human being which the migrainous attack provides. We see, we may feel ourselves, the gradual disintegration of function of the normal person, exactly as we do in a case of stroke or brain tumour, but without the disaster of the permanent disability.

In tandem I've also purchased a book that came highly recommended by a trusted friend and fellow migraneur. David Buchholz has supposedly crafted a program focused on eliminating the use of over-the-counter medications to combat migraine (because of their notorious rebound effects), making dietary changes to eliminate or reduce the effect of triggers, and using more effective and targeted migraine medications to prevent or abort migraine attacks. My last migraine series was the worst in a long time: five days of periodic migraines, with almost no relief provided by the Rx that had helped in the past.

Today we're cautiously optimistic, but one of the unfortunate characteristics of my migraines is that they often come upon me with very little or no notice. For the time being, though, we're going to proceed with caution, and start our reading tonight.