Profile: Town House

Town House

Vocab from The Golden Age of Political Fundraising

Snippet from The Washington Independent:

On Aug. 20, thousands of people — 1,700 have already committed — are being encouraged to donate to the younger Paul’s campaign in a “moneybomb” modeled after the single-day events that raised $5 million and $6 million for his father during the 2008 campaign.

Is it Monday? Feels Like a Monday!

Leonard Cohen interview; Steve Turner, NME, 29 June 1974:

Finally I ask him whether he finds a lot of joy in his life. He laughs a little to himself. “I don’t know,” he says. “I don’t look at it in that way.”

“I don’t go around looking for joy. I don’t go around looking for melancholy either. I don’t have a programme. I’m not on an archeological expedition.”

Archeological expedition! LOLZ!!

Corner Office

From http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/15/business/15cornerweb.html?pagewanted=1&em:

Q. Do you have a favorite gadget?

A. I’m pretty addicted to the BlackBerry. I love the iPhoneApple because I think they’ve so figured out computing. It’s hard in business to make that leap when you’ve distributed systems that use I.B.M. and Microsoft so much. But I’m pretty addicted to that BlackBerry.

I started taking them away in meetings at Quiznos, but the C.F.O. there is just addicted to it, beyond probably what most people are, and he was just watching that light, and he wouldn’t answer it because I said you couldn’t answer your BlackBerry in this meeting. But he’d look at the light and the light would drive him nuts, so I had him turn it over. And then, of course, I took it. He was doodling during the meeting as we were talking, and when he got up to leave the room I grabbed the paper he was doodling on, and he had doodled a complete, to scale, picture of a BlackBerry. Subconsciously, he doodled one while we were sitting in the meeting. That’s how addicted he was to it. I actually still have this. I’m going to give it to him framed.

*  *  *  *  *

I think it’s important to talk to people about how we’re in a fundamentally different world. Ask the question, “If compensation isn’t going to be the same for a while, where do you get your fulfillment in life?” Certainly, work is a big piece of that and work is rewarding well beyond compensation. But faith, family, friends and hobbies create real balance. The conversation I’ve had with a lot of people, both in large groups and small, is make sure you have balance in your life and make sure that all your fulfillment doesn’t come out of economic gain.

I’ve talked to a lot of people on Wall Street where their entire fulfillment came from the answer to, “Is my bonus bigger this year than last year?” Or, “If I worked 100 hours a week this year, can I work 101 next year?” It’s actually a great time for us as leaders to help people to step back and ask the question: “Where do I get the fulfillment in my life? And how do I make sure my job is a big piece of that?” I’ve found that employees who are fulfilled on a much broader basis in their lives usually do a much better job of work than those that are completely, single-mindedly focused on and get all their value out of work.

I think that’s one of the bigger questions we have as a society. We’ve gotten so used to every generation doing better economically than their parents. Are our kids going to do better than we’ve done? I hope so, but I’m not sure. So it seems like we ought to tell them that socioeconomic wealth is not the only, or even the most important, metric of personal happiness.

Winter Haiku

Shiitake potstickers, sesame crusted tuna

Sweetbread sausage, squid and artichoke galette

Spanish octopus and lobster paella, suckling pig

Types of Humor

Economy Plan

What if, instead of giving $1,000,000,000,000 to banks and car companies, the government gave $300,000 or so to every citizen in the United States? I think that might have a stimulating effect on the economy.

Homework

I’ve already told you goons to put your nose in Alasdair Gray’s LANARK at your earliest convenience, but as that wee bookie is not so wee and we’ve all got other fishes to smoke with our brains, might I suggest another, speedier read by the same author: POOR THINGS. I find my man Alasdair shares a number of stylistic similarities to one M. Vaise, not limited to archaic prose style and judicious application of grotesque surrealism, as well as illustrations both figurative and literal. I will not go so far as to say your minds will be BLOWN, but Mr. Gray addresses the “How do we get off of the snake?/How do we get out of hell?” conundrum rather more directly and more vigorously than any other author that comes to my mind. . . Perhaps I am so enthused because his literary conclusions are so much like my own. . . BE THAT AS IT MAY, me so recommend.

David Ferry

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m going to put up a few posts on this book of poetry, new to me, that I’m into. I will be pushing it like Ooga Booga, so be prepared to either give in right away and tell me you like it, or cope with me pestering you about it until you give in and tell me you like it. I’m not bossy, I’m a psychedelic fascist.

 

To entice my two readers, I might add that:

 

(1)   The cover features a non-erotic ETRUSCAN MOSAIC.

(2)   The book was winner of the 2000 Rebekah Johnson BOBBITT National Prize for Poetry. (If you move  the N from National and the P from Prize and settle them astride the 0’s in 2000, it basically says Poon Bobbits, and we all have spoonerism these days like a Math Bat anyhoo.)

(3) The first poem to be posted will concern our beloved Spotsylvania (and remind me of that eerie scrap book Tristan found in his attic).