Hillsdale College – William F. Buckley: “This website contains the complete writings of William F. Buckley, Jr. Transcripts from his long-running TV show, Firing Line are available at the Hoover Institution.”
June 7, 2008
June 4, 2008
Artists’ notebooks
MOLESKINE — DETOUR: SPECIAL EXHIBITION OF ARTISTS’ MOLESKINE NOTEBOOKS
Intriguing what folks have done with their Moleskine notebooks.
Eric Hoffer used Boorum & Pease Memo Books, 4 1/2 x 7 1/4, 98 pages. There are 131 notebooks in the archives, dating from 1949-1977. Hoffer used his notebooks as places to stash his thoughts, which he would later retrieve and craft into his published writings. In all, the Hoover Institute, which holds the Hoffer archives, has seventy-five feet of Hoffer work.
Paul Madonna uses yet another type of small notebook, sketchbook. Neither Moleskine nor B&P, I don’t think.
I am an obsessive note-taker, carrying a book on me at all times. I have a theory that we have only so much space available in our brains to remember thoughts. A small percentage of ideas are realized, and if we waste energy holding onto what may later turn out to be a trite idea, we may have missed or forgotten the one of gold. he says.
He revisits his notebooks frequently looking for ideas for his work. In his studio, he has a shelf holding all his notebooks since he began his journey. All his drawings … he can go back and find something he drew three years ago and remember the angle of a gable or the detail on a portico. Or he can go back to when he first started drawing faces and see how he’s changed. He can find snippets of conversation he’s overheard or ideas of something to draw. I look at his notebooks and think, wow. This guy is really focussed on what he does. This guy has an archive of thoughts and sketches that will feed his muse for a long long time to come.
I always intend to keep a notebook that captures it all. I have a few Moleskine notebooks that I’ve bought (because I like blank, bound books) and which the younger nib has given me (accompanied by “Write, Mom!” sorts of notes). I usually wind up, though, with scatterings and scraps of paper with dates and notes and words I need to look up, meanings known but not really, allusions known but not really, quotes that appeal. … The scraps of paper are often the tab end of a full-page ad on non-magazine stock. Know what I mean? You tear out the ad and there, at the back end of the magazine, is a strip of paper stock about 3″ wide and the height of the magazine.
I sorted and stacked Monday for the FirstMonday meeting at my place that night. I wound up with a large envelope (picked out of the daily mail, ‘natch) filled with these scraps of paper. (And that’s just the bits and pieces lying around uncaged.) Later I’ll re-copy them onto blank notebook pages but … where’s the retrieval mechanism except for thumbing through old notebooks?
When world famous author Sal dies, there will be some archive of what made her tick besides the unreachable archives of what she wrote on a computer and posted to the Web lo’ these many years past. There will be dozens of half-used notebooks where Sal started thinking about keeping track of her thoughts and where she was and where she thought she was going and then …
Do you use a notebook to stash and store anything? Pictures? Notes? Thoughts? Do you draw in your notebook? Have a grid that you adhere to? Add color. Write lies?
San Francisco Real Estate … the sales effort
Found a 9×14″ (or whatever) envelope in today’s mail from Pacific Union/GMAC Real Estate, from our buddies Steve (Steven Mavromihalis) and John (John Fitzgerald). Cover letter is signed (really) with first names only.
Steve and John are shopping the sixth floor of the C. Alfred Meussdorffer-designed 1800 Gough. (1800 Gough units are full-floor.)
Steve and John sent us an eight-page full-color brochure with drop-caps and lovely copywriting, describing the Fujitso Plasma HDTV, the Yamaha MusicCast audio system, the ceiling mounted speakers, the kitchen, the bedrooms, the “welcome and dramatic sense of arrival … opens to a secure elevator vestibule finished in exquisite black lacquer wood and featuring a unique silver leaf ceiling,” “The residence becomes simply magical as dusk falls and the golden dome of City Hall becomes the centerpiece, glowing amongst the backdrop of San Francisco.”
For those reading from afar, this is code-speak that 1800 Gough is on the southern slope of Pacific Heights, facing the City and not the Bay (or the Golden Gate Bridge, or Alcatraz, or … well, you get the idea.)
Nowhere in the brochure is the price mentioned because, well, because prices have been known to change and who knows how big a print-run Steve and John had for the brochure.
“Dramatic City skyline views, peering towards Russian Hill and beyond to the Transamerica Tower and the Oakland Hills.
The range is a six burner Thermador (meaning “gas,” I assume. I’d never buy this place without gas cooking in place).
I looked at all the pics. Found one I thought Ms. Paula would rilly like. Checked out the price.
$3m.
Um. No.
And, alas, the pic I thought Ms. Paula would really like isn’t on the Web site. The pic was of the walk-in closet for the master bedroom (which has TWO bathrooms so you don’t have to squabble over who gets the sink first when you’re brushing your teeth before beddie-bye).
The walk-in closet shoe shelving built-ins appear to carry six-plus pairs per shelf. Twelve shelves showing in the pics. WE’RE TALKING ROOM FOR SEVENTY-TWO-PLUS PAIRS OF SHOES.
Oh. My. [fanning self]
(How did our name get on Steve and John’s list of potential buyers?)
June 3, 2008
10 Unexpected Costs of Owning Things
10 Unexpected Costs of Owning Things | almostfearless.com
I know this is true.
The hundreds of magazines I recycled last weekend? I know I probably would’ve never found time to read them. I know more come in every day. I know I don’t need all the books I have. How often do I listen to a given CD?
Do I need my stuff?
But the thought of giving up my stuff gives me the shivers.
Bit by slowly bit … maybe.
BONK and the bookers
The gang was over here tonight for dinner and a discussion of Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex by Mary Roach.
Suffice to say, the comments around the table were less laudatory than the reviews we’d all read.
Dinner was a salad with a simple oil-balsamic dressing, Gorgonzola gnocchi (from Trader Joe’s) and sherry Parmesan shrimp (shrimp from Trader Joe’s). Dessert was chocolate macadamia nut brownies (macadamia nuts and chocolate chips from Trader Joe’s). Oh, did I mention the mixed salad greens were from Costco as was the brownie mix the brownies were based on? Wines from Trader Joe’s too. Sparkling cider from Costco. All well-fed thanks to Trader Joe’s and Costco.
Back to Bonk. The reviews are splendid. The actuality less so, in my opinion. Had we been set up by the wonderful reviews so any reality would be a let down? Maybe.
We discussed our favorite bits and our letdowns. Wisecrackery. Tedium. Wiseassery.
Mary Roach used to be a San Francisco gel, used to be a member of The Grotto, a writers’ collective that includes Po Bronson, ZZ Packer, Laura Fraser, others. Roach now lives across the Bay in Oakland and no longer is part of The Grotto.
The bookers are skipping July because too many of us will be out of town. August read is Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez. September (a week late because of Labor Day) will be PopCo by Scarlett Thomas. (The PCV in Ukraine told me to read Thomas’ The End of Mr. Y and I found it intriguing. He told me to read PopCo as well. Another booker had been told to read PopCo by someone who gave it rave reviews. PopCo it is.)
October will be Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin.
Spent most of today making the house presentable. Stacking my piles of stuff. Vacuuming. Cleaning. Sweeping. Rearranging. I’d figured out the menu over the weekend and made it simple enough that cooking wouldn’t be a stress.
Everything worked out just fine. I’m off the hook for hosting until later this year. (The nice thing about hosting, though, is you don’t have to find a way home after.)
The August location is over in the Mission. September is just up Montgomery, off Alta. October, November are up at the top of the hill.
May 30, 2008
TimesMachine – New York Times
TimesMachine can take you back to any issue from Volume 1, Number 1 of The New-York Daily Times, on September 18, 1851, through The New York Times of December 30, 1922. Choose a date in history and flip electronically through the pages, displayed with their original look and feel.
The Web is a wonder.
Update:Note: TimesMachine is available only to home delivery subscribers. Contact your library for complimentary access to the complete archive of The New York Times offered by ProQuest.
Dang. Sorry to get everyone’s hopes (including mine) up.
Most public libraries in the United States offer access to ProQuest to registered library users (e.g. reference tools available at San Francisco Public) but not access to the PDFs. Drat. Dang.
May 28, 2008
Sailing, sailing, over the bounding main*
Spotted last evening before sunset.
Note UCBerkeley campanille in the east bay hills behind Treasure Island at about 10 o’clock.
*Geoffrey Marks, 1880.
May 27, 2008
Memorial Day weekend guests
Picture taken last night of the cruiser tied up at Piers 15-17 over the weekend. When the Exploratorium takes over Piers 15-17 (Port Authority and City willing), the deal requires that the Exploratorium keep the piers maintained and clear for the occasional Navy ship to dock.
The cruiser leaving this morning with the help of two tugs.
May 24, 2008
Twitter / Ev: Note: Before joining a mob,…
Ah. I’m getting a glimmer of what this cryptic tweet was all about.
What a world.