Monthly Archives: October 2009

All Over the Place

Fall is in its fullness right now: the yard is a mess with leaves, but there’s a line of evergreen trees between my yard and a neighbor’s, and against that wall of green are the different colors of this yard’s trees. A fiery red-orange against yellow; a yellow-green yellow blend; some light green turning orange …

October 23, 2009 – 10:03 am | By ashok | Posted in personal | Comments (5)

Arts and Letters Daily has some worse links than usual today…

1. Carlin Romano has written a screed against Heidegger that I skimmed the first two paragraphs of, felt sick, and immediately stopped reading. I’m not linking to it here – his essential point is that Heidegger was a Nazi and shouldn’t be taken seriously, and recent scholarship seems to show how much hate he was …

October 22, 2009 – 9:32 am | By ashok | Posted in media, philosophy | Tagged | Comments (0)

Emily Dickinson, “Expectation – is Contentment” (807)

“Expectation – is Contentment…” (807) Emily Dickinson Expectation – is Contentment – Gain – Satiety – But Satiety – Conviction Of Necessity Of an Austere trait in Pleasure – Good, without alarm Is a too established Fortune – Danger – deepens Sum – Comment: The poem plays with “expectation:” one expects “gain [is] satiety,” but …

October 22, 2009 – 12:34 am | By ashok | Posted in dickinson, poetry | Comments (1)

Links, 10/20/09

In Afghanistan, Army cook transforms rations into a mean burrito (h/t David): The anticipation is palpable on Mexican night at this tiny US base in the mountains of Paktika Province in eastern Afghanistan. Every Thursday, soldiers start lining up an hour early as Spc. Jose Flores hand-rolls more than 200 made-to-order burritos for the base. …

October 20, 2009 – 8:26 pm | By ashok | Posted in links | Comments (0)

Requesting some promotion help…

This isn’t to bug anyone – truth be told, a lot of you have been a huge help in promoting, and I’m grateful. But in case you’re bored and you want to be that much more help, I am not going to turn down the offer. It’s been 3 years of blogging, I feel I …

October 20, 2009 – 2:15 am | By ashok | Posted in blogging | Comments (0)

Nomi Stone, “Why I Came”

Why I Came Nomi Stone Djerba, Tunisia Under amber, the nearly lost city: I dream myself here, to enter how I imagine we had once lived, until our cities were paved over, stones from our graves laid in the new city’s walls. I came because here, amber flooded and cooled over the homes, over hands …

October 19, 2009 – 10:24 pm | By ashok | Posted in poetry | Comments (3)

Uninspired

The dull light of a chalky gray sky settles on the wet yard, and some colors are more vivid: dark greens and intense reds and purples do well soaked, with patches of shade all around and lighter colors dulled. I can’t say I’m happy with the look of things: it feels icky just to look. …

October 18, 2009 – 4:01 pm | By ashok | Posted in personal | Comments (1)

Links, 10/15/09

Busy. Actually getting work done. A few links about some things in the news: Eric Hoover, “The Millennial Muddle: How Stereotyping Students Became an Industry” (h/t aldaily.com)- long, not much here that you haven’t seen before, but fairly thorough. Definitely a case study in the thinking that makes modern education less about education and more …

October 15, 2009 – 3:15 pm | By ashok | Posted in links | Comments (0)

Links, 10/13/09

Two links from Ario: one is from his blog, his experience with Lichterfest 2009: Twenty years to the day the Monday Demonstrations started in Leipzig which cracked the hereto monolith political system and shortly thereafter would lead to the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9 1989. The other link is to this amazing …

October 13, 2009 – 10:10 pm | By ashok | Posted in links | Comments (0)

Thomas Jefferson to William Ludlow: Monticello, Sept. 6, 1824

I googled Mr. Ludlow several times, but didn’t find anything particularly relevant. If anyone has any information pertinent to these reflections, paste links or references in the comments. The letter below is from here: Sir – The idea which you present in your letter of July 30th, of the progress of society from its rudest …

October 11, 2009 – 6:30 pm | By ashok | Posted in politics | Tagged | Comments (0)