All Things Must Pass

I’m a straight, white, middle-class Englishman, and as such have absolutely no interest in fashion. I’ve nothing against it in principle; if it floats your boat then good luck to you, everybody needs a hobby, but it’s not something I can force myself to worry about all that much.

Fashion forward.

'Til the Bitter End

I'm not sure I have any thoughts I could usefully add regarding the whole Edward Snowden situation, apart from noting that a few people would now have every right to say "I told you so."

So I'm just going to link to this article, because it would seem to mark the exact moment it tipped over from tragedy into farce. Though I suspect it'll tip back again all too soon. Please read all the way to the end. If you can't manage that, just the last couple of paragraphs will do.

Look, just read the final sentence, will you? Then maybe find a quiet corner for a nice little weep.

Shhhh...

For extra credit, here's some reading on crustaceans.

1Q84 Book Two

              “Who switched the tracks?”

              “Who switched the tracks? That is another difficult question. The logic of cause and effect has little power here.”

Just in case you were in any doubt.

The Geography of Thought

How Asians and Westerners Think Differently…and Why

Richard E. Nisbett, 2003

(June 2013)

  

God, I hate this book so much.

Why you are laughing?

Late to the party on this one, as ever. I have nothing to add beyond that already provided by other more thoughtful people, and am posting this largely for my own future reference.

This will be important later, I feel.

1Q84 Book One

OK, so I was wrong about the goat, but he doesn’t half bang on about her tits, doesn’t he (spoilers, btw)?

Balance of Trade

I was a judge at a speech contest a few months back. The day started well enough; cup of coffee and a sit down with the organizers and other judges to go over the grading criteria. One of the organizers said that he’d introduce us to the contestants and audience at the start, and asked us how we’d each like to be described. My initial suggestion of, ‘Sage, Polymath, and Renaissance Man for the Coming Millennium’ was rejected as ‘factually inaccurate’ so I had to settle for ‘ALT at school X’. I then asked if he could at least do it in the manner of a wrestling ringside announcer, but this too was deemed ‘inappropriate’. Some days you just can’t win, eh?

Information Theory

An Introduction to Information Theory: Symbols, Signals and Noise

John R. Pierce, 1980 [1961]

The Mathematical Theory of Communication

Claude E. Shannon and Warren Weaver, 1949 [1998]

(June 2013)

One of these books is a very dense, technical work, heavy on the jargon and academic prose and littered with equations and diagrams that are very difficult for the layperson to get their head around. And the other is worse.

All The Thyme in The World

Seriously. It's growing like a fucking weed and we can't use it up fast enough.

Anyway. As promised, here's your picture of a cake. I even got all artsy with the residuals.

1Q84 Readalong

This is How She Fight Start in conjunction with Two Dudes in an Attic is proud to present for a limited time only and in glorious Technicolor our briefly awaited and barely anticipated 1Q84 readalong. That’s right folks, June is Murakami Month here on TIHSFS; it’s like Shark Week except without the blood and gore and perfectly evolved and adapted prehistoric predators and lengthy panning shots of the majestic and untamable oceanic depths. And it’s a month, not a week. So it’s like Shark Week in that it’s a pair of nouns.

(It’s all going to be like this, by the way.)

The Teleportation Accident

Ned Beauman, 2012

(June 2013)

Ned Beauman is an arsehole.

Japanese Fairy Tales

Yei Theodora Ozaki, 1903 [1970]

(May 2013)

The caption to the frontispiece reads as follows:

Prince Yamato Take bade his wife help him to attire himself like a woman

So right from the off you can be pretty sure of what you’re going to get.