I once saw a pocket trumpet miraculously transformed by a car into something vaguely resembling a plate, but back in 1753 James Hanson and his father were condemned to transportation for trying to achieve the opposite without paying for the raw materials. This text is from the online proceedings of the Old Bailey: (M.) James…
I’ve put in something new that has got rid of virtually all my spam which, although it mostly went straight to trash, had reached 3500+ daily. As far as I know this will have no adverse effects on normal people, but give me a ring if you suddenly find you’re having problems reaching me by…
Lovely line in La Vanguardia, discovered lazing on top of an article re bullfighting: Bullfights fracture the allergy of intellectuals to proscription. And, continues the article, The generation of May 68 postulated a tolerant and flexible society to the unanimous cry of “It is forbidden to forbid”. This is one of the most important, most…
Jordi says (comments) that this La Vanguardia writer misuses his sources and has a dubious attitude towards Jews. Mr Robinson disagrees, and explains why. Meanwhile, I’m still waiting to hear news of the sacking of Rafael Ramos (search), whose sins are incontrovertible.
Funny old world: just when I announce that this blog will henceforth be devoted to politics (ie money, sex, violence and food), Language Log goes and blogrolls me. Cool, cool, incredibly cool, but I know a secret agenda even when I’m on the drugs. What this is really about is one Mr Liberman@LL kicking his…
Thanks to the DG for news that the post about John Cage has bumped the Columbia Encyclopaedia off the no 1 spot for the word “thallophytes.” Now it’s time to work on our ranking for “Nazi wives” (post re a bizarre episode in Hispano-German relations), for which we’re currently in 10th place.
There’s a nice little number with this title on the New Scientist site: Milford Harrison edits what he describes as a “thrilling” journal called Waste Planning, and he was so struck by the units that kept appearing in the press releases he received that he wrote an article about them. It includes such gems as:…
Re the Abramovich boat post: I’ve been contacted now by three British newspapers, one gentleman who sounded suspiciously like a Russian investigator, various salesmen and a couple of nuts. Honest, I don’t know where the boat is, I haven’t got the faintest idea how he paid for it, and it doesn’t interest me in the…
Frequently racist paranoia vis-à-vis “imperialistic cultures” like the “Anglo-Saxon and Germanic” (with particular reference to the former) has permeated political thought of most varieties here for a long time and has been particularly evident in the last year or so. Sometimes, however, conflicts of interest arise. José Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955) was an elitist liberal…