ABULAFIA:: Zeitgeist






		2 0 0 3 DEC. 02 DEC. 01 NOV. 04 NOV. 03 NOV. 02 NOV. 01 OCTOBER 03 OCTOBER 02 OCTOBER 01 SEPTEMBER AUGUST 02 AUGUST 01 JULY 02 JULY 01 JUNE 02 JUNE 01 MAY 02 MAY 01 APRIL 02 APRIL 01 MARCH FEBRUARY JANUARY WEDDING L I N K S AAA Abulafia Boardwalk Bread CHN Christ Lutheran Church Neighborhood Research Institute Old Oaks Olde Towne Polyphony INTP Business First Business First Daily Edition Call and Post Columbus Alive Columbus Dispatch Columbus Free Press Columbus Post Communicator News The Daily Reporter Inner Art The Lantern The Other Paper Suburban News Publications Short North Gazette NBC4 Columbus WSYX 6 10TV WBNS ONN BBC World Service CNN Christian Science Monitor The Guardian IndiaTimes Newsday New York Times StarTribune Washington Post Washington Times AfricaPundit William F. Buckley Jr. Command Post Crooked Timber Daniel W. Drezner John Ellis David Frum Hit & Run Instapundit Mickey Kaus Joshua Micah Marshall The Note OxBlog Virginia Postrel Wes Pruden Jim Romenesko Andrew Sullivan Volokh Conspiracy Day by Day Doonesbury Ted Rall Peter Steiner Tom Toles Tom Tomorrow Rob Pegoraro Matt Drudge Cronaca Languagehat Language Log Open Brackets PaleoJudaica Arts Journal Communication Arts Mooch Bluejake Blue Ridge Blog Candid Colors Conscientious Dublog Ecotone Wiki Found Magazine London and the north Maps and territories Mysterium Smoky Mountain Journal Writing with light Cheryl Holtz D.U.I. Studio Columbus Underground Forgotten Ohio Illicit Ohio Midnight Exposure Ohio Exploration Society Ohio Lost Acme Art Company Ballet Met CCAD Columbus Arts Columbus Arts Festival Columbus Metropolitan Library Columbus Museum of Art Columbus Symphony Dialogue Franklin Park Conservatory Glass Axis Music in the Air Opera Columbus Thurber House Wexner Center City of Bexley City of Columbus Columbus City Council Columbus Police Columbus Public Schools OTENA egroup OTENA-NIC egroup OTENA-tours egroup OTENA-trustees egroup Old Oaks egroup Ohio Parsons Blockwatch egroup				> DECEMBER 04 s D E C E M B E R 2 0 , 2 0 0 3 Amy at sea From Stephanie Wine & Michigan Blueberry jam f D E C E M B E R 1 9 , 2 0 0 3 Amy to Aruba Vacation (in)complete Did I wish to accomplish too much? Did I plan to accomplish too little? I was hoping for a rejeuvenation, a reäwakening, at least a calmness. It escapes me still. Every time I get in the car, I am as angry and irritated as ever. I have barely begun to clean and order the house. I have not even begun to repair and rehabilitate what is still in disrepair. This evening I noticed that the first floor furnace is not working properly. I was afraid that it simply had quit, though it is fairly new (just out of warranty, of course). It seems to work some, however. The most I can deduce from it is that it has simply decided I want it to be 59ºF (or rather It wants it to be 59ºF) and thus it will be. The happy digital face happily informs me that the actual temperature is 59ºF and that it is set to make it 67ºF, and yet it does nothing. But let it drop to 57, and on roars the furnace to bring it back to 59. Then off again. We have tried setting it at everything from 39ºF to 89ºF with absolutely no change in behavior. Regardless, it brings it up to 59 and stops. This occupied my evening; the frustration that somewhere, something is working, and why should I have to call for a repair and spend much money I don't have. If only I could communicate with the machine. If only it had an on/off switch that wasn't shunted between thousands of chips, bytes, bits and electrical impulses but would simply do what I tell it when I tell it to. But I will have to call. I will have to find someone proficient in the language of a computer chip that doesn't even know something is wrong. Columbus Health Department. Photographs Gallery One Gallery Two FirstEnergy has trees near main lines cut down \| Dispatch FirstEnergy Corp. is removing trees from beneath major power lines after a task force’s conclusion that limbs touching power lines contributed to the country’s largest blackout. "We are not going to have lines sagging into trees anymore," said company spokesman Ralph DiNicola. "There won’t be any trees." That's the spirit. Now if they could just get rid of those perky customers, they wouldn't have to bother with customer service, either. r D E C E M B E R 1 8 , 2 0 0 3 Amy at sea Portal Park, Olde Towne East. Not quite the open sea of the Caribbean, but it was peaceful and quiet. A little cold, but the gently falling snow was quite nice. Beyond the mainstream Editorial \| Washington Post Mr. Dean's carefully prepared speech was described as a move toward the center, but in key ways it shifted him farther from the mainstream. A year ago Mr. Dean told a television audience that "there's no question that Saddam Hussein is a threat to the United States and to our allies," but last weekend he declared that "I never said Saddam was a danger to the United States." Mr. Dean has at times argued that the United States must remain engaged to bring democracy to Iraq, yet the word is conspicuously omitted from the formula of "stable self-government" he now proposes. The former Vermont governor has compiled a disturbing record of misstatements and contradictions on foreign policy; maybe he will shift yet again, this time toward more responsible positions. Mr. Dean's exceptionalism, however, is not limited to Iraq. It can be found in his support for limiting the overseas deployments of the National Guard -- a potentially radical change in the U.S. defense posture -- and in his readiness to yield to the demands of North Korea's brutal communist dictatorship, which, he told The Post's Glenn Kessler, "ought to be able to enter the community of nations." Mr. Dean says he would end all funding for missile defense, a program supported by the Clinton administration, and also has broken with Mr. Clinton's successful trade policies, embracing protectionism. Sadly, on trade his position is shared by every Democratic candidate except Mr. Lieberman (and Ms. Clinton). I rarely listen to politicians' speeches. They are, as it says, "carefully prepared," and I don't feel particularily enlightened afterwards. I prefer to know what they've done before. Mr. Bush's record in Texas was weak, unexceptional, and showed no hint that he was prepared for an astronomically larger challenge. He has developed vision (domestically rather abbreviated -- cut taxes seems to be the extent of it; internationally very bold and forward-looking), but has not demonstrated the managerial skills and leadership to achieve his greatest goals. Mr. Dean's record in Vermont is far more impressive, and I have been interested in his candidicy as a result. Yet there comes a time when what he says raises such concern that it cannot be overlooked -- and that time is close. His most serious departure from the Democratic mainstream is not his opposition to the war. It is his apparent readiness to shrink U.S. ambitions, in Iraq and elsewhere, at a time when the safety of Americans is very much at stake. I would like to think that he is a credible opponent to Mr. Bush. The vision he is espousing, however, is far from one I could support. Good news for the schools Owners of arena lose tax battle \| Dispatch The Franklin County Board of Revision yesterday increased the taxable value of Nationwide Arena by $26.4 million, rejecting the owners’ arguments that the structure is worth less than a quarter of what it cost to build. Eyesore of the month James Kunstler w D E C E M B E R 1 7 , 2 0 0 3 Amy to Grenada Birthday dinner in Bexley Ham, sweet potatoes, angelfood cake Afterwards we watched Ohio State barely barely escape with a win over Furman. House arranging Or attempts at said. The alcove. Rare common sense Appeals Court: Cows aren't cars \| NBC4 Columbus A cow is not a motor vehicle and a Medina County couple who hit one on Interstate 76 can't collect under their uninsured motorist insurance, a state appeals court has ruled. "A cow is self-propelled, does not run on rails and could be used as a conveyance. However, there is no indication in the records that this particular cow had wheels," the 11th Ohio District Court of Appeals said. William and Wendy Mayor hit the cow in Portage County the night of Sept.5, 2001. Wendy Mayor was injured. The couple sued Halcyon Insurance Co. to pay for her treatment because the cow's owner rented the nearby farm and had no liability insurance. The insurance company's lawyer said uninsured motorist insurance can't cover animals. "If you can't get the cow behind the wheel of a car, it's not going to work," attorney D. Michael Johanson said. Hopefully this is a return by Ohio courts to common sense in uninsured motorists cases. After the Ohio Supreme Court ruled that uninsured motorists coverage for a business applied to an employee doing virtually anything anywhere anytime (daydreaming of a motor vehicle seemed to be sufficient to invoke the "motorists" insurance) unless the policy specifically denied it, underwriting in this state was becoming an act of extreme foolishness. Any court restraint has to be welcomed. It just keeps coming back Franklin County Sherriff's office gets DARE grant \| NBC4 Columbus You would think that in these times of tight budgets, programs that demonstrate no benefits would be abandoned. The effort to keep school children off drugs is getting help from the state Attorney General's Office, NewsChannel 4 reported. The Franklin County Sheriff's Office has received a $158,000 grant to continue the Drug Abuse Resistance Education -- or DARE -- program. Columbus police dropped the program this year to spend the money on more officers. Columbus has been trying to cancel it for years because it wastes manpower and has had no demonstrable effects. Columbus still needs more actual officers on the street far more than Franklin County needs an ineffectual program. They were just helping him out ... Connecticut governor vows \| New York Times ... out of the goodness of their hearts? Mr. Rowland has acknowledged that he accepted gifts like a hot tub and a heating system, and free work on his lakeside cottage from aides and friends, some of whom are now at the center of a federal investigation into state contract awards. While he has not disclosed the value of the work, the Rowlands paid the contractors roughly $13,000 at least three years after the work was done, just as the press began to ask questions about the cottage. ... [T]he crowd heard his wife, Patricia Rowland, deliver a stinging sing-song rebuke of the news organizations that had reported on her husband's shortcomings and the widening federal investigation into his administration. Opening with the line " 'Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, except me, the first spouse," she read for the crowd a poem that praised her husband and damned the press, particularly the state's largest newspaper, The Hartford Courant. "They used to be good girls and boys, Santa said," the poem said of the press. "But the poison pen's power has gone to their head." How dare they report the truth about the governor? A good sign Glimcher to buy Eastland Mall, add new-style Kaufmann's \| Columbus Business First The 120,000-square-foot store is scheduled to open by fall 2005, said May Chairman Bill Gingerich. New ownership of the mall was a major factor in convincing May to build at Eastland, he said. ... Hoeller said Glimcher Realty thinks the mall is positioned to capture shoppers from the fast-growing Pickerington and Pataskala areas. Glimcher Realty will renovate the mall to make it more competitive with newer malls, such as Easton Town Center, although no decisions have been made on the designs. Eastland is an aging, old-style mall surrounded by acres and acres of uninterupted asphalt. A shooting took place inside the mall just last week, and the neighborhoods close by it are not the safest. This should be quite a challenge for Glimcher. It's all in how you raise the capital for expansion The Starbucks v. Subway puzzle \| ProfessorBainbridge.com That's what I would say. Most of the time, if I work at it long enough, I can come up with a transaction cost story that explains the particular governance structure I'm studying (at least to my own satisfaction). I've done it for things like insider trading ,participatory management ,the existence of boards of directors, the business judgment rule, and limited liability . There is one governance problem that vexes me, however; namely, why are Subway stores owned by franchisees, while Starbucks stores are owned by the corporation . Classic Peanuts Originally published December 17, 1971. Not exactly one of the more memorable strips, huh? Unless I'm missing something allegorical in it? Perhaps it presages my intermittent stage fright when in the presence of more than four people. Oh, well. The best birthday card ever The Heath bits were awfully nice, too. t D E C E M B E R 1 5 , 2 0 0 3 Amy to St. Kitts The house of Mr. McClintock Website (He has A House for Mr. Biswas on the second floor -- which is how a Google search led me to his house). Links Changing New York: 1935-1938 \| Photographs Maps of Spain \| Enggass Collection Abelardo Morell \| Photographs Green Lawn Cemetery Charles Evans Mary Hopkins Evans A House for Mr Biswas V.S. Naipaul Reading group guide \| Powells.com A notebook for Mr Biswas \| Amitava Kumar Critics go on at length about the symbol of the house in Biswas . It is undeniably the book's central motif ; Mr Biswas's flawed pursuit of the house is a grand narrative of anxious striving and failure. But, what makes the search meaningful is not the house in itself but the reason why Mr Biswas longs for it. He wants to write. The mismatched pieces of furniture that Mr Biswas carries with him are the props for the stage on which he wants to define his selfhood. This self is a writing self, and it comes into being with the son. This is the strand that unites in Biswas the story of the ambitions of the father and the son, the writer and his subject. The single line that comes to Mr Biswas every time he wishes to test a new ribbon in the typewriter is the following one: At the age of thirty-three, when he was already the father of four children ... The half-finished sentence lights up momentarily a whole dark universe of desire and futility. And yet, despite the terrible isolation of his ambition, it is also true that Mr Biswas's haphazard, incomplete actions carry him from the plantation to a life in writing. It is a supreme achievement. Whenever I think of that, the symbolism of the house pales in comparison to those other symbols that represent the writer's journey: in the beginning, the painting of signs; then fresh newsprint on a page; after that, the writer's desk made of packing crates, and hidden in its drawers diplomas from a writing school in London, an unused passport, and pink, young mice; the typewriter with its song of escape and despair - At the age of thirty-three, when he was already the father of four children ... ; the short stories attempted by Mr Biswas in bed, putting pencil to paper while making sucking noises with his teeth. Blaming Saddam for everything Jimmy Breslin \| Newsday How could you not blame Saddam Hussein for everything? He murdered his own, yes. And he was going to kill all of us with nuclear weapons. "I know they are there," Bush announced. There was nothing nuclear about Saddam hiding in his hole. There was no anthrax or smallpox, just rats and lice. But the unmistakable feeling is that more and more of the American public will consider Saddam Hussein a partner in terror with Osama bin Laden and that it was a wonderful thing we did, going to war to catch one of them. This belief in two enemies probably is going to be welcomed by Larry Silverstein, the builder who by mouth alone, has made it appear that he owns the land, the buildings, the sky above and the water below. Silverstein has $3.5 billion coming as insurance for the raid. He contends that they were two separate attacks, one on Tower One, a second on Tower Two. Therefore, he wants to be paid double. Seven billion. The insurance companies involved are inclined to do battle. Without the double insurance payment, people around him say, he won't be able to build a front stoop to a building made of thin air. "Two attacks," Larry says. "Larry, it is the World Trade Center attack," he is told, including by judges in early rulings that were at least ominous for Silverstein. Perhaps there was a chance in the freezing air. He can claim that Osama bin Laden made one attack on a tower and then Saddam Hussein's suicide bombers went into the second tower. Two people. Two attacks. Two payments! Jimmy Breslin completely underestimates the benefit of removing Saddam Hussein from power. (He calls him "Saddam", just as the media and U.S. politicians generally seem inclined to -- I suppose there can be a propoganda reason for doing so, but it should always be "Hussein" in news stories I would argue. Am I missing something? Is is appropriate in Iraq or the Middle East to refer to the leaders by their first name? And when Breslin does it in his column, as Rumfeld seems to have turned into the abhorent "Rummy" just about everywhere, here it doesn't seem mocking, so I am confused again. Perhaps to drive home the smallness of the man hiding in his hole?) But he does highlight the lack of candor (even truth?) that characterizes this adminstration's dealings with the press. Night/day A bright night and a dark day, and not much differance between them. You could hardly tell the sun was up. m D E C E M B E R 1 5 , 2 0 0 3 Amy to St. Thomas Advent colors Blue lights in all the windows One "N" or two? Kaufmann's doesn't seem certain. Just now getting around to this. It's been several weeks -- they've had plenty of time to fix it since I first noticed. Lazarus-Macy's, which is closing their downtown store next August, is apparently not going to bother adding the Macy's part to their downtown store's signs. The final "S" in Lazarus is already dark on one of the major vertical corner signs; perhaps it will go dark one letter at a time until their abdication is complete. So much for architectural branding Once CVS gives up on a location, the neighborhood is still stuck with the "corner fortress" CVS delights in building no matter how incongruous. This can't be good for CVS's image. Did the possibility never occur to anyone? Did they reject it as impossible (that CVS could find an unprofitable location)? Did they not care? Or do they just not feel the need for brand integrity in rejected neighborhoods? Complaints of the day 1. Store hours that are posted in tiny print on the door, so that you must get out of your car in order to decipher whether or not the store is open. 2. Stores hours posted in tiny print on the door that are not accurate. n D E C E M B E R 1 4 , 2 0 0 3 Amy to San Juan, Puerto Rico Amy's cruise Leaving soon from San Jaun, Puerto Rico We talked on the phone; there was much activity on the docks. The snow in Cleveland had led the airline to move their flight earlier in order to make connections. Out of gas Independent dealers say their days are numbered \| Dispatch One of the more interesting local stories I have read in the Dispatch business section lately. Something not mentioned, however, is the terrific expense that a station must incur to meet environmental regulations these days. It almost takes the deep pockets of a major company to line and protect the gas tanks. And if something goes wrong, only a mjor company is going to be able to pay to fix it. Industry experts acknowledge the challenges that independents face but say it’s debatable how much oil companies are to blame. Good dealers in good locations will survive, especially those who modernize by cutting costs and increasing the size of their operations, observers said. Not sure about the sourcing in that paragraph, but ... 125th Celebration Christ Church's 125th Anniversary, celebrated by (Presiding?) Bishop Mark Hanson of the ELCA. Who speaks quickly and with many words. The former ALC, one of the bodies that merged into the current ELCA, was headed by a "presiding bishop." The official title, as far as I know, of Mark Hanson, the head of the ELCA, is simply "bishop," however he is commonly referred to, at least in my circles, whether out of habit (the merger was in 1988 -- Lutherans take generations to lose habits) or convenience, as the "presiding bishop." Snow in the back yard this morning. Beautiful CNN reported this morning that Saddam Hussein had been captured overnight in Iraq. Alive, he is no martyr. Surrendered, he is no hero. That accomplished -- now for the hard part ... > DECEMBER 02