My Friend Mark...

So I've this friend named Mark. He's very nice if you know him and not so nice if you don't. I mean, he's not rude or anything, he's just kind of a standoffish prick if you're a slob like most people. Do I float my own boat by saying I'm proud of having him as a friend, you bet I do, but he's the type of guy from whom you hear really interesting things. Yesterday evening I got an email with the title:

Bertrand Russell quote
[the following is all that was in the email]

One of the commonest things to do with savings is to lend them to some Government. In view of the fact that the bulk of the public expenditure of most civilized Governments consists in payment for past wars or preparation for future wars, the man who lends his money to a Government is in the same position as the bad men in Shakespeare who hire murderers. The net result of the man's economical habits is to increase the armed forces of the State to which he lends his savings. Obviously it would be better if he spent the money, even if he spent it in drink or gambling.


Now, Mark didn't get points for passing along a quotation the way most people pass along bullshit forwards. Nope. Mark gets points for quoting Bertrand Russell and for being a former military man like myself. This is exactly why we need more than two parties in this nation...there's no way we should have to be simply for or against something...

A lot of the time I like to think I'm like Mark, against stupidity.

stolen from wombat

1. Pick up the nearest book.
2. Open to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.

this is from The Schoolmaster:

And although Sturmius herein doth far pass all other, yet hath he not so fully and perfectly done it as I do wish he had and as I know he could. For though he hath done it perfectly for precept, yet hath he not done it perfectly enough for example; which he did, neither for lack of skill nor by negligence but of purpose, contented with one or two examples because he was minded in those two books to write of it both shortly and also had to touch other matters.

Bartholomaeus Riccius Ferrariensis also hath written learnedly, diligently, and very largely of this matter even as he did before ver well De apparatu linguae latinae.

(who ever said context was for pussies?)

fucking Deconstruction...

Man, dumb French literary theory drives me insane. I mean, seriously, I'd like to think that we've moved beyond purely linguistic literary criticism at this point, yet we'll still be wading through the morass created by second-rate nitwits with Ivy League educations for the next two decades simply because scholars in the 80s and 90s got caught up in the Derridean and Lacanian agendas of publishing useless crap. Ugh!

I can forget working on the car...I've got to finish critiquing Endlesse Worke...at least Goldberg got his title correct!